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you may attend in person or via Zoom parties wishing to be heard this matter should appear at the time and place indicated above so uh I would ask for a motion motion to open the public hearing for the class two license I'll second that uh motion is made in second all those in favor say I I and motion to suspend until we finish this discussion I'll second that motion's been made in second to suspend until we finish this one all those in favor say I I I okay so gentlemen I think you're here for the other hearing we're suspending it for some time but we'll we'll get to you so I would just say to sustainability Committee just hold on these things sometimes take longer than expected so we'll have to take you after we do the class two license yes I'm going to drop off and back okay sure oh good good thinking okay all right thank you Claudia so um and I again I also appreciate every um all the you know this is a difficult decision um so you know my own feeling of this is that I I do agree that we can take these measures rather than euthanizing the dog um which I'm certainly cognizant of the the trauma that this is involved um and you know I'm sorry that it all happened um these are not an easy decisions so um is there so we've made the only thing I do have questions about not having the child I thought that was kind of an important um how do you see getting around that in the future if there's if say there's the dog is there with just a young child and that would seem to be kind of important I would see that they if you know if they're the respons responsble dog owners that they seem to be showing us that they are regarding the you know the the retraining of this dog and the willingness to put in a a muzzle that if they already have a small child in their home they're going to be cautious with that so that if other children come they would continue that cautiousness um and if we were to say that it you know it I mean the the the the actual thing is that as a dangerous dog Cooper shall not permit a child under the age of 17 to own or have the care or custody of such dog so obviously the dog the child is never you know not someone under 17 is not going to own the dog these are the dog owners and that um again that they would not leave the dog in the custody of or care of their young child but the way this is stated first of all it's not relevant because the dog they the dog is owned by these two adults so okay all right any other one didn't seem to make sense to me any other further discussion on this before we yes go ahead I just have one comment sure and Claire it's for your dad you're a victim here too you know you put you put I but you put your dog down you put your dog down man okay that goes that goes a long way okay I just want that on the record thank you okay all right are we are we uh ready to vote and motion's been made in second all right so others in favor of the motion as stated say I we don't need a roll call vote this is just I yeah uh any opposed I all right so we have one person opposed so the motion carries 41 All right so I believe that can I just make one only because I'm the one who made the motion um I want to thank you for your honesty and I can again I can relate to how difficult this is um on both sides certainly you know with Quinn being put down and Cooper almost did but didn't and the last thing I would say is to you Claire and Richard you have some serious responsibility here but I also think you have people who are going to support you um and and help you through this and just continue to support your neighbors and and I wish you the best of luck and as Claudia said should you no longer be able to do or keep Cooper the way we've expected you to that you'll know the right thing to do um it's never easy having to make that decision to let a dog go or let a pet go um but good luck with it thank you all right that concludes uh our hearing on this matter thank you all for coming yeah thanks okay thank you oh boy okay all right thank you guys thank you all right so um thank you Donna thanks Donna um so we need to unsuspend a hearing motion to unsuspend the public hearing for the class two license in favor unsuspending say I I I oppose that okay so gentlemen you can come up you're here for the class two license I presume and just a reminder everybody anyone who wants to speak come up to the microphone is there anyone is there anyone remote that is wants to speak on this matter raise their hand or make themselves known okay I think I've opened the hear hearing's been open so do we have a presentation by any the staff on this uh review or anything I don't think so um typically it's the do you guys have a pres a brief presentation you want to so this is a license transfer so we have the new owner here who's the new owner and who's the old owner I think and you're the old you come to the microphone yeah so why don't you come up here and yeah over here yeah right speak into into that microphone so Folks at home can hear you my name is Hector ibera I'm Jose padil uh we've been been we've been Partners here in Ashlin since um we started back in 2007 with JC Auto Sales we left there um we started New Beginnings on Nickerson Road about 11 12 years ago uh around 2010 2010 uh we've been leasing that place we been we've been up and running um and the opportunity came in the table we've been great friends with Ronney ree here for many years I I don't know the count but many years and um yeah the opportunity came on the table and we're looking to continue to grow the same way you guys gave us an opportunity when he was 20 and I was 30 not knowing what we were doing I think we got our feet on the ground now as young kids after following good steps you know and we just need to clean up the place and keep it going under the same pretty much Legacy that what have they done for 40 50 years we're trying to take over and keep it in good hands and keep setting cars okay questions thoughts any issues with the paperwork Susan it's all complete she's nodding yes um everything is complete but just for clarification this is not a transfer of a license this is a new license the current license for Middle sex Motors is going to be turned in and this will be a new license that'll be issued to them there it is he has he has it this is one of the hottest things I've ever done in my life 37 years right with you guys all you as you know you've been with me the whole time okay so it's so it's so we're we're closing a license and oh that's funny yes so we're closing we're we're canceling one license and and looking to create and offer a new license yes we're not cancelling Nickerson Road though right so you're going to have two Li thank yes please you're still standing that sense now you're looking to stay at that is correct on Main Street yeah on W Street good for you guys thank you thank you that's that's the idea to be on a main road back on a main road cuz for many years a lot of people said oh it doesn't matter where you are with the internet but um I feel like people are going back to the old school days stopping by the shop as long as it looks good looks presentable with the nice inventory I think we're going to be all right okay all right so yeah you just question I know all the paperwork is in I sawry everything I I don't see anything uh out of line with that you're looking to have a total of 18 vehicles on that site yes okay and I saw the map and how you had it all out there Ron how many cars did you have out there so I had 18 cars yeah when I got the 18 car license there was two businesses there okay so I only had the the east side of the lot which is that exact same drum y that was 18 cars and then DFC Auto Repair was in the garage and they had the remainder of the building okay and on the back on the back side there's a whole lot more room so now it's an opportunity now that I'm there's only going to be one person in there now it's going to be these guys okay okay so there's an opportunity for them to expand okay and and do what they're doing and he's they're doing they power washed the building they've done the office over it's on the bathrooms over I mean he's going to town yeah we he's really doing a great job it's going to look really good over there yeah nice I'm and he's letting me be a little bit involved with a little which keeps keep you engaged yeah we are he's let me hang around a little bit this that's making me happy too so it's making it easier for me you know what I mean yeah now I know on Nickerson Road uh you had somebody that was going to be doing the um mechanical work offsite what's what is there an an understanding that you'll be doing a mechanical work there or no I'm doing the whole shebang is theirs I'm done okay he's going to have the garage and everything's legit everything y everything so you be doing mechanical work on site so so pretty much I mean like the idea right now we we have is um to have more like like a showroom type of place you know I mean like um the the building I mean like it's right on Main Street you know so what we would like to do is pretty much I mean like instead of doing mechanic have more as a showroom nice Vehicles inside you know I mean like that people can actually go and see and vehicles ready to go pretty much because if we already have a facility that can do mechanic you know I mean like we're 5 minutes away from each location you know so we can just pretty much right get the whole cars ready on Nickerson Road and when it's ready bring it to uh Main Street we we're going after the the nicer stuff we're we're kind of done with the oil changes more mechanical stuff so we're we're planning on really cleaning up that location as far as you know even even some of the stuff around just clean it up make it look nice and see what we can kind of stay on the retail side nice clean not have to wear the boots anymore I remember how old I was when I kind of moved from that old stuff that needed a lot of work yeah you mean the duct tape yeah uh so it's very it's going to be similar to the uh setup that's on Route 126 right now uh used to be the old at uh no no this is the one further down that has a showroom itself okay JC yes be similar to that idea okay Mar yeah it used to be TR is Marina for us all folks yeah that's that's where we started so I do remember the marina yeah uh any further questions I know we're having a fun time here all right uh do I have a motion motion to close the hearing second all those in favor of closing the hearing say I I I oppos None hearing's closed uh motion to approve the new class last two license for a new beginning auto service at 73 Waverly Street with the hours so uh with the hours listed in your application yes cor second motion's been made in second to Grant the new license all those in favor say I I I oppos None okay congratulations you have a new license congratulations good luck thank you for thank you again these are positive things we like to be able to support you can give to be able to support and see a business grow like this in town that's great I got a copy of it we really thankful we my son took my science down do anything and he put a post on Facebook that I still can't read I still can't read it was it when was it in 2012 do you remember was it this time of year or was it later in the year janary okay then the only one sitting here would have been Joe it was me in January 2012 I remember going down there looking at the second going said fa very young that yeah yeah thank you very much good luck thank you the best of luck bye all right so we have um the next item is the um uh report from the sustainability committee did Ash make it back Ash has not made it back yet okay you ready Sam so we will um well I expect him back I expect him any minute should we discuss the town manager's evaluation process yeah I think that's a good of course I didn't I well don't we have a subcommittee working on it aren't they going to present or are you um I I thought you wanted to go through okay sorry go ahead this is this year's process oh we're just reviewing the just reviewing what we're going to do from now before before May yeah that's all go ahead okay got a lot of paper here today but I think it's it's the same one so what is it we want to discuss about this so I put together a proposed timeline oh for the board and I think it's just really kind of reviewing that and making sure that you're okay with it this is before the uh yeah so this uh we would still be using the evaluation form that we've currently been using the email um so you know what I'm proposing is that on March 22nd or by March second I provide the board with self evaluation um in between March 25th and March 29th um the board members would complete the individual evaluations uh sent to the town manager and then we'll take the week of April 1st through April 5th to um to meet individually and to go over those EV individual uh evaluations that would leave uh April 7th through April 10th time for the board to send their evaluation to the chair for compilation and then it gives the chair a little more than a week um ending on April 17th uh the chair gives him an opportunity to develop a composite evaluation and statement um which would then be released at the April 17th meeting so this uh keeps things in time for the current board um before there's any change over and again it would be the last meeting in April so um typically we don't have a first meeting in May it's typically done before town meeting yeah um so hopefully uh if you're okay with this um we move forward with that I think so okay I think so I'll make my my compilation Swift and So currently does is the evaluation all handwritten so in the past Susan has sent it to us so we can do it electronically yeah you should you should have received a copy with with the packet yeah but Susan in has been able to send it to us so we can do it all so it's a fillable PDF that you can then print out and save and send back yeah okay and then that's good so we could also do it as a I set it up as a Google form and we could do it and then it would apps you could tabulate it automatically and everything so who does maybe I could sit with I think it did no yeah we did have one we did have I remember doing it manually one I remember tabulating automatically really we last time I did it as chair I did it manually last year yeah so I mean the only thing is is it's going to change the whole thing is going to change again yeah I know so you know already if you were able to put it into the it's already there oh it's already there CLA you've already done it oh so how does that how would that work then Claudius so we would so here so you this is a a sharable document yeah so what I do is send it to you right and then it forces you for each of the categories right you choose one through five or na um and then it then it gives you a place to add comments and then you go down and it moves on to the next category same M right and then the very end and then it feeds into a um it feeds into a spreadsheet so you can tabulate I don't know if you did score by just total number if you did it by some kind of point value assigned to each no each it was total number and total number it looked like that when I looked at them and then it was be total and then divided so that you you know either doing an Aver an average so we can set it up to do that easily I mean I just thought great it looked like a lot of work for the chair thank you for being so consider I think I think in the past I thought I thought that Susan did the averaging but you you actually I did it three years ago whatever okay well I don't think Susan needs to do any extra work either right very good I think that's a great idea I so can Michael like Michael will need a copy of each of our evaluations before it goes to Rob right that's how it'll right but we should we should each be able to save our own yeah evaluation and then yeah how does that so is this one a single sharable like we're all like access in the same Google doc is that it's a form so everybody gets a copy of the form and fills it out and then um I can take that and create we can automate the creation of a a document that would be for each of us and how we responded great um with each respondent and then Michael could have those so that's great wonderful great thank you for doing that yeah I actually printed one to show all everybody but I forgot it at home oh jeez well that helps us yeah helpful right I do that a lot I print stuff and leave it leave it in the printer as chair I especially thank you so all right umh is here Ash Ash Ash is here yes all right sorry hi Ash come on up well us schedule yes um my daughter wanted to be part of the Civic process and then she decided she didn't yeah she she had enough of that she was she's saw part of it she absolutely enjoyed she got a good taste got the fun part so Ash what I know are you going to do a presentation are you set to do that that's available to you yes or I can hook up and I can make it available and just to kind of review and yoland you could add the my understanding of this is there's kind of a twofold purpose here one we have our program to interview uh committees and I think this is sustainability but also they are very active and are proposing uh a warrant article for town meeting so I think we also thought this was a good opportunity to yeah get into that so as we said we we want to have committees to start coming before us and a number of people thought sustainability was a good one to start with and then with the discussion of the tree bylaw and um there was another one that they're looking to have before town meeting I felt that it was good to bring them before us today I know my understanding is the tree law tree bylaw is not going to be coming before Springtown meeting it's not but I want to give you I think an update on what's going on and oh thank you so terms of pretty much it I think we're talking so we'll see how things go and um Ash has a long pres has a a lot of slides but I don't think he intends to spend much time I don't think it was that many slides 15 minutes that's why 15 15 minutes then we can get into discussion you uh already sh at all them right some of it's history so oh okay I but I think he understands it we I looked at yeah I looked at a first the first few I guess I was more interested in some of the other stuff in no no I I was a there's more content there more for your own reading than than anything else yeah okay for for you know nighttime reading there I promise you I'll try and make it as painless as possible it's all good stuff Micha okay we good yeah we're good chani chair of the sustainability committee attend to speak fast so tell me to slow down if I'm going too fast for you okay all right so uh the intent behind giving you this update was was uh twofold one there's been a lot of conversation about the trade bylaw um some of it was understood some of them there was a little bit of misinformation um there have been a lot of development so we wanted to give you a quick update on to where that stands there was a lot of interest in town around the tree BW um so uh we'll talk about that we also have as part of that we realized that there was still a little bit of a misunderstanding as to what the sustainability committee has been focused on and what the priorities of the sustainability committee are and why we even focused on a tree bylaw so as a starting point where I'd like to maybe start is you know just reminding folks that um our our focus is to achieve Net Zero by 2040 which is a chter that was given to us by by the town uh and since our last update we've given you a couple of updates on it um you know we've had Sam join us obviously uh she wasn't here when I when I last spoke to you uh which we're thrilled about um but you know Sam's been working with the MC to track progress we're not on track uh not even close uh but uh we also have helded a lot of open houses we participate with uh uh in in a lot of town forums um you know whether it's uh we don't do ashon day but but we do do like farmers markets and I think Brandy I've spoken to you a few times at at farmers markets we've we've been part of other events at Town um so that's that's part of our agenda to really educate people uh on the topic of sustainability and why it's important to Net Zero uh but we also have continue to engage you know whether it's in participating on Town Projects um you know we sponsored a number of Articles uh we have started run into a few challenges so I wanted you guys as as the board that's nominated each of us we are a volunteer board uh we've had a lot of churn um we've had a lot of people resign so a large portion of last year for me at least has been trying to rebuild the pace of the Comm committee and sort of pick back up on our agenda uh we've been slowed down on it a little bit uh and uh we do have we we have started uh reaching a point where we we might be needing a little bit more professional guidance since all of us are volunteers we all passionate about the topic we've educated oursel on the topic quite a bit but there are certain areas like when we start getting into building codes and things like that that we starting to feel that maybe having some engagement with an outside consultant might be useful so starting to think about that um but there are a few things that uh we wanted you as a select board to be conscious of uh that that there are actions that you can take so I'm just going to hit those up front just in case we run out of time a lot of the presentation then is going to be supporting this uh but um just in setting Direction and focus I think we've tried to engage on a regular basis I think we need to do better with engaging you as well with more forums like this uh but um this is what I was talking about getting some you explore ways to find some funds to get some subject matter expertise for example on the tree BW um Margie did an enormous amount of work to get it to a certain stage uh we worked with the planning board Our Hope was that between those engagements we'd be able to get the expertise but obviously we run into issues with how should we measure a tree or how should we cost something out where having input from someone who's done work in that space would have been probably better suited earlier on in the project uh and and that's something I'd like to maybe bring back in as we rethink what we ought to do with the tree bylaw that's going to require funding uh as a committee we've never really come to you for funding requests so I'm going to work with Michael and maybe Rob just to try and figure out what that should look like and maybe come back to you with a few proposals I'm not quite sure I'm ready to make that ask yet but that's something I'm going to start exploring ing um second we are going to put the opt-in code which did not pass down meeting last time there have been some material changes there a lot of updates there so I'm going to spend a few minutes today just talking about that but we are going to bring that warrant article back uh and then you as a select board have the ability to take action on something called the PACE program which allows businesses in Ashland to effectively get loans um that will allow them to make Energy Efficiency improvements but then pay for those loans uh out of the savings that they get get right out of the energy efficiencies they make so um how that works is by basically putting a lan on the on the business and for that the town has to one time opt in to the program itself Massachusetts runs it uh to the PACE program us as a select board and then the business owner then has the ability to even apply for a for a BCE loan um so I've got a little bit of detail about that in the presentation I'm not going to cover that or drain that a lot but that's more one of the reading material things that I left for you happy to come back and talk to you about that uh and then we uh have been talking about Brandy one of the suggestions you had made at the town for at the open Forum we held for the tree B was around education and maybe looking for ways to find um ways to expand you know the the tree canopy um so we've been investigating DCR has an urban forestry Grant uh in support of that though we'd like to maybe have the town formally apply for and get uh a Tre City USA certification from the Auber day it has a a basic level of requirement that that we can spend a little bit of time on what it does do is opens up funding opportunities with either Partnerships with corporate partners that Arbor has or with the state for example this DCR program around urban forestry does give preference to fre City USA designated cities so these are just some things that we've already sort of come back with as being constructive things that we can do that don't cost the town anything uh in a material and I believe we actually kind of already meeting some of those bars so we'll speak a little bit about that before we do though just remember why we're doing it this is you know for that goal of 2040 and we had done the the foundation of the plan really was focused on where do we get emissions from right in the town and so this was the survey we had done it's been reborn out by the mapc survey that was done after after the fact as well and the major thing to take away from here is the vast majority of our emissions come from transportation and from buildings uh and so when you think about Net Zero it as a concept is about one reducing the emissions that we have as a town from those buildings from Transportation um being the major sectors and then it's about expanding the absorption of carbon away from the atmosphere and which is why we talk about the tree BW for example because the only way we we know for sure to remove carbon is through ecosystems from trees wetlands and protecting those and expanding those right so as a town we're never going to get to a point where we can basically make our emissions zero that's not practical so what we have to do is find the balance between reducing emissions and then increasing the way that we capture carbon and that's why we kind of focus on both of those as being really important aspects of achieving n zero so the efforts that we take then are really focused on where can we reduce emissions how can we encourage people train them educate them have programs around it and then how do we have uh programs that will effectively absorb carbon away from our atmosphere so we can achieve that balance um so for now just in the next 12 to 24 months our major Focus areas again are going to be focused on one energy Supply so Michael you've done work around making our aggregation contract for example 100% renewable right and we've been having a conversation about how can we make that that's a great first step how can we move that to more local options you know um whether it's part of the aggregation program or it's expanding solar uh options within town right um so that basically allows us to Green up our energy Supply itself and then when you take that essential component of now you have a green energy Supply how can we switch the usage of energy then towards that Supply Source right so when we look at buildings and transportation then a big priority becomes electrification right so it's around expanding the use of heat pumps for example so we've done for example a a solar pump challenge in the past uh we now have a group called energized ashin so um I I'd say they're removed from the sustainability committee with a lot of support from the sustainability committee they'll probably want to come to you and and sort of Proclaim themselves a little bit uh but but the main goal there was to create a Grassroots effort to actually talk about uh Energy Efficiency create energy Champions folks that are not necessarily focused on a committee level but rather our you know residents that are sort of doing things at a Grassroots level and then this is where the adoption of the specialized code really becomes important because it basically allows that new buildings really start switching to Electric uh and and without that you know we'll never really achieve Net Zero at all right so so that becomes an important aspect of our of our next 12 to 24 months uh getting access then to a PACE program I think is an easy way for us to open up funding for businesses to start switching over to electrification and and doing Energy Efficiency again doesn't cost the down anything uh Michael it does require effort from town staff because you now have leans that you have to manage so there's a management component to it but you get a lot of support from the state um on both education as well as setting up that program right so once you opt into it uh you know you actually unlock a lot of support from the state to to to kind of set up the program properly in this in in the town uh and then we continue to do work around establishing uh whether it's newsletters whether it's the talks that we do around rebates that are available incentives that are available and we continue to do that I think Sam's doing an ex excellent job in in just doing a lot of Outreach there on the Sam do you want to come up here and because I think we all like to see you a little closer and if you have anything to add to um we're very happy that you're here and if you have anything to add a comment to this feel free okay yes I will I was gonna say I will let Ash finish his presentation and then I can sort of that's great great thank you use to change thought yeah uh so then if you go from buildings then Transportation you know again our focus is again on the specialized stretch code because it has aspects of it so my very next slide is just going to spend a little bit of time on the specialized stretch code uh but uh it's really around expanding EV charging infrastructure and then pushing for the greater use of EVS in the municipal Fleet which again I think some you've been doing a lot of work on so you can talk about it when we get to you and then the ecosystem side is where we focused on drafting and adopting a tree bylaw uh we are pausing it we're not going to bring it for this down meeting but I have a set of steps that I want to talk to you about uh that that we'll take you know in in in trying to sort of achieve that and what we've done so far um but also we're going to start looking at uh how we introduce uh and pursue sustainable development practices so when you're doing construction how can that be made more sustainable you know um so that we are effectively reducing the impact of the environment during that construction period itself um and as much as possible our goal is going to be that we try and follow the state on this I think we' made the statement at a town meeting as well that we don't believe as a as a town we necessarily have always the infrastructure to kind of go It Alone um but there's a lot of Engagement and lobbying at the state level to make sure that the right things get passed but then it's on us once those bylaws are passed or once uh an opt-in code becomes available for us to adopt it because if you don't then it's kind of wasted all right so in terms of this stretch code um last time when we spoke about it at town meeting uh there was a lot of confusion as to what it was that that the opt-in code included and what was the difference between between the stretch code and the opt-in code uh I presented this light then uh and I'd actually gotten confused myself uh candidly right uh so one of the first things that I want to kind of point out is we already have the stretch code and this is super important because as of July 2024 a lot of the efficiency gains and the requirements that were were a part of the opt-in code if you had adopted it then are now actually going to be part of the stretch code automatically so they already apply right um and and the second thing that I had confused people on was that uh and actually I'd done that at the select board meeting when I presented was I I suggested incorrectly that Renovations were were were under the aises of the oped code and they're actually part of the stretch code so candidly the state really really messed up how they rolled this out it was super confusing even for people who had actually gone through this line by line fortunately over time now that's been clarified quite a bit we've spent a lot of time with Doug uh we spent a lot of time with Trisha just trying to sort of take this thing apart and some of the important things that have happened one there are now 31 communities that have adopted this um unfortunately because ashin decided not to adopt it uh a few of our neighborhood towns used the justification that if ashin didn't find it good enough then we shouldn't find it good enough and really for no other reason basically rejected the optin court for just that reason so I'd like to correct that record we've been leaders usually I'd like not to be a leader in in not adopting something like this that's funny um but uh we have worked with the planning board the building inspector to clarify a lot of the confusion I think we've got a much better handle on sort of what this thing is well we've worked with Trisha not not technically a planning board right Trish has been representing that's right um uh there is better cost data and studies well I would be careful about that so make sure if you think you want to hear you should probably appear before the planning board yeah um there's also better cost data and studies that that are starting to emerge because obviously now with 31 States uh 31 cities you know adopting it uh about 25% of the state's population is already covered by uh you know and then as I said the most important change is that as of July 2024 um the stretch code and the specializ could really have a lot of parity on the performanc and efficiency standards with one exception of multif family houses that are greater than 15,000 squ feet uh where they have to go passive home which was that there are two Pathways in the in the stretch code one is me a higher rating and if you are going to be mixed fuel then you have to have an even higher efficiency rating in the case of buildings that are over 15,000 ft and they're multif family you really don't have the ability to use uh mix fuels you basically have to go down the passive home pathway um but apart from that one one uh change really the only thing that gets left out then what we effectively would be requiring by adopting the specialized code would be one pre-wiring for all buildings so whether you're if you're all electric you already are pre-wired but if you are choosing to go down the path of uh you know a fossil fuel based heating system um for a new building then the Builder has to pre-wire the building up front and the and the rational behind that is obviously while the buildings being built putting the wiring in is way cheaper than it is to try and do that as a retrofit so that's number one number two is if you're using mixed fuels then you have to account for a certain amount of solar PV capacity so if you think about the priorities that I laid out for you up front right expand solar local sonar electrif five buildings and then the third one is effectively a requirement for electric wage charging you know those the the specialized code really hits at all of those three things that we really have to do and State's already kind of done this we are already getting hit by or the builders here have to already adopt the stretch code because we already are part of it so all the efficiency standards are there you know addition of the specialized Cod just gets us these three additional things that I believe are are super critical and really are rightly done for new buildings um first and foremost um so I'll pause there that one was actually a a a big thing so this is what we'll be bringing to town meeting uh and I have presented this to the ABA as well um I think Michael you met with them today I I met with them a couple of weeks back it's they posted that on YouTube we had a great conversation I think they were expecting me to talk about the tree bog we ended up talking about this but we spent almost an hour talking about it uh and it was basically a Consortium of Builders real estate agents uh we got great questions and you know not sure I I've sold it to all of them but I didn't really get push back from all of them either so yeah I think it's helpful to have that kind of done so we'll hopefully save time and confusion at town meeting uh in the interest of time I've posted this uh cost and savings data you know this is again from the state um I've given you the link but you know with the incentives that are in place and if you take into account the sort of annual savings what this is showing is that you know the addition cost imposed by the by the requirements of the stretch code really are now you know at part they really make a $100 $200 difference right uh in in terms of um in in terms of the impact you know that that's created it's no longer in the hundreds of thousands of dollars right but again I won't Rin this just in the interest of time um happy to post these slides I think Sam we can probably post it post these slides up on our on our website all right as far as the tree bylaw is concerned we we we had a rationale that you know when you drive around town Ashland as a town obviously feels very green we've got Ashland State Park we've got hopin State cart we've got a great Town Forest um we've got we've got a pretty rich history of doing conservation but the reality is and I've got a little picture that that maybe brings this this was um this was a heat island survey I think uh Sam this was Framingham State did this and MPC had done this right so this is towns of ashin and and and uh Framingham and what you can start seeing is you know the urban effect you don't we don't think of our ourselves as a particularly urban town at least if you look at like downtown and you look at that Elliot Ste treat area you can start seeing that heat island effect starting to show up and this is really a result of a lot of development that's happened in town and and because we starting to lose that tree canopy um so our goal first and foremost was to start to preserve some of that tree canopy and then uh it's not just about trees it's about the ecosystem those trees live in right so whether it's Wetlands whether it's soil you know those are all carbon stores so if you think about the two-legged stool of net zero right we've got to sort of protect the things that actually take carbon out and if we if we keep getting rid of those ecosystems then then we really don't have a hope and heck uh to try and Achieve our goals uh in addition to that there is a pretty significant economic cost losing trees so we we heard a lot of feedback you know that oh my God this is going to make the cost of building so much more expensive guess what we're paying for it anyway it's just a social cost this is classic tragedy of Commons right where the cost is born by society which isn't particularly obvious but when it becomes obvious in a in a specific area now suddenly everybody's sort of worried about it uh whether it's because you know we have a loss of wetlands or or drainage issues or Wastewater issues right somewhere someone is paying for this anyway so it's it then becomes a question of balancing out how we we equitably introduce protections that don't necessarily penalize one or the other group but still provide those protections and and sort of bring bring back the character that the Town had uh and our goal always was really to try and sort of take that broader view not necessarily go after protecting one tree at a time you know from a net zero perspective you know yeah we we'd love to protect the historic trees but but that doesn't necessarily achieve the goal right it is about protecting the larger tracks of land that that are still sort of composite together I remember Michael um two years back you and me had a conversation where you were like ash don't go after the individual trees like look at those those un undeveloped tracks of and try and focus on on on trying to protect those right so that's been the goal um it was also never our goal to try and shut down development we were conscious of the F fact that the town in and of itself can't really uh afford that right so the challenges that we had and the feedback that we got really you know one we we' done a survey in 2023 that that did show overwhelming you know support for the program but you know getting support on do you want to protect trees is relatively easy actually turning that into a bylaw a little bit harder um but we we knew that it was important to do and we heard this pretty clearly right even on the open forums that we did including the much publicized uh one that we did in collaboration with the planning board we heard people come in very much in support of protecting trees and fighting climate change I had a number of people who came up and said we're not doing enough um I also had members of the planning board tell me that the that the current set of rules do not pro provide Clarity so while the planning board does do a standup job of trying to figure out how best to mitigate impact of development you know they don't feel like they have the right set of rules uh or or the right structure in place to to always achieve that goal um and you know if you don't do it now you know there aren't that many contigous areas of trees I I had John Ellsworth tell me that there's not that much left well to me that's actually why we should do it because there ain't that much left right um so uh but on the on the other side right there were some really important parts to this right uh one you know how much unnecessary regulation do we put in there uh the fact that the cost would be unfairly put on a small minor minority of developers I'm just trying to channel the actual feedback this is not in any way sort of my opinion uh but you know we tried to be as um impartial on the feedback that we received and sort of just projected as it was right um and so so given all of this feedback it was clear that we needed to continue to have a little bit of conversation we weren't quite ready you know uh on on this topic um so some of the things that we we are planning to do um April 6th we're going to have another open Forum uh which will talk both about actually this structure you know why we're doing what we're doing but have a really open conversation with residents on what it is that they would like to see uh from sustainability and and where they they want to focus what are their priorities uh but then specific to the tree bylaw you know really think about whether it is an individual tree bylaw do we want to consider what should be the area of impact uh should we maybe focus on low impact development rather than just a tree bylaw uh you know consider so the nuances behind specific Provisions uh you know and the kind of cost that that that might incur I have invited as many of the folks that are in the building Community to to come and join that that Forum as well and I'll I'll make that invitation to all of you as well as any residents that might be listening we will be posting more details on it I'm trying to work through the the logistics with Susan but we plan to do at least two more of these forums uh where we'll try and gather this additional data in addition to that um you know we we did hear loud in career that we need to find ways not just to protect what's left but also expand tree cover so this is where I'd like us to start thinking about the a recognition some of the programming from DCR for example you know is a 50/50 funding match right so if if we if we put your put a proposal together the town would have to actually agree to fund 50% of it but then we get 50% of the funds from DCR so so you know are we willing to do that do we have the budget to do it I think those are things that we have to sort of work through um that's the bulk of what I wanted to share with you I've got a little bit of detail which I've sent to this leport you know on what the PACE program is um including the links to mass development Michael again I'm happy to work with anyone on your staff on this um Tri City USA the the main requirements that that we need I think we kind of already meet this but but Becca would be able to guide us better we have a Town Forest committee so I think that qualifies uh we also have Becca you know U that that sort of represents the department um we do have again uh an urban forestry program I think we probably hit the two $2 per capita budget number on that uh and then you know you guys would have to basically say yep we're going to observe obser our day and and and do a proclamation Claudia I believe margu is already working on an unofficial Pro uh our Day celebration for this year which will be a little smaller uh but but we're hoping that next year we'll actually formally be able to do it then then that also then sets us up you know to really start looking at additional funding sources all the education we want to do our also gets a support on that education so you know it'll sort of help us hit some of those things that that weren't coming through in the tree by lot of talking in a lot of fast pace so I'll pause here see if you guys have questions and I'll also let you join me sure yeah Sam did you want to say anything well we're considering our question or thoughts about and certainly um happy to have you here happy to be here um I think Ash really went in depth with everything so nothing I will say I believe we already cover an Arbor Day celebration because the library does one and they hand out saplings because I know Becca has done a lot of work in looking to get us to Tree City so the Lions um and I I can't remember um I'm embarrassed that I can't remember her name right now who passed away and every year she would bring saplings um for the entire fourth grade class Ellie Ellie thank you yes oh greater that's why yep and she every year she brought a sapling per student now you know the one way to kind of expand upon that right is some of the things that Margie and I have talked a tiny bit about um but it it certainly you know is I think an important um role in that and I'm not suggesting that there we shouldn't be doing things now but you know the way to change the world is through our kids and and through mothers right and um so I you know I think that's really um important part of what we should be doing is trying to work with finding ways to um engage students with kids with that information right I fully agree yes I think you you've been having some great conversations with the school as well and you were trying to put together an art project with them as well on on on this yes I don't know if we're going to make my goal of um Earth month April but I've been working with the high school I've been working with all the principles at the schools but mainly at the high school um I recently learned through an Eagle Scout project that's going on that at the high school they go through about a thousand plastic water bottles a month which gave me nightmares um so trying to work with the environmental action Club to sort of I had an idea for an art installation out of water bottles to show like this is the impact um to educate because I think the youth is the ones to really capture yeah I would agree I know the high school a couple of years ago I forget which group was giving out birch trees so but that was at least that was a couple of years ago you could reach out to them that you know was in their announcements you can get a birch tree planted in your yard and so I think it's important for us to do as a town want to get a little closer sorry as a town to sort of make that Proclamation and and actually make it a a little bit more formal right so I'm I'm thrilled that we have a lot of Grassroots sort of observation but um you know I I think whenever we step up as a town uh and as Town leadership to to sort of formally recognize you know things like this I I think it has an impact right and I think we' we've started celebrating Earth Day now in a much more consistent format I think that makes a difference uh green up ashin makes a difference right um things like these actually matter so one of the things I wondered about um to is you know we have our select board uh grants coming up and I wondered if like the sustainability committee might be able to apply for one um in which then you could use those monies maybe for some education in the schools and and perhaps we could purchase um you know some prizes because one of the things that Margie had brought to me was um you know a contest I think a poster contest um you know so maybe they could be you all could be an applicant for one of our grants um candidly Claudia we have applied for for for one that that that we couldn't really get through and and the goal was education and I think this is where we run into the there's it's it's a fully much like any other Town group right it's a fully volunteer group and uh you know there there are there's a lot of passion around around different topics but when it gets to you know actually doing things like this it it requires a slightly different effort and mentality I'm great at doing this not that great at at setting setting things up so having now Sam here I think we we've managed to get get a little bit more progress there but I think this is where we also need to sort of maybe look at is the sustainability committee the right group or or you know places like energ ason are are are as a group I think we're good at ideation and maybe the the Strategic think on things not always the best executors right so so yeah just in response to that what I what I think we found with some groups is we have the upper Charles Trail committee but they also have the friends of the upper Charles Trails who is a 5013c who is doing some of the fundraising is doing some of the things like that because to Claudia point about a grant if we wanted to give money to the sustainability committee it wouldn't go through it if it goes through the baa Grant it couldn't be from our runnner money have to be from our select board gift account because they're not a 501 rece no I was referencing if you have another group that is looking to become a nonprofit to support what you're doing that's a different story and I think that's that's the goal with energized ashin is as a group I I I don't think they've they're quite at the stage where they've applied for things but they they're putting together Rob Mullen beak and and that team has done a ton of work so I'm not going to try and take credit for it right um that that's where the credit really lies right for now I was thinking the gift account because I didn't think that you'd be able to pull up in a 501c in time so but there's still what is it a thousand we could also make an exception if we want right so I'm I'm thrilled that like first of all thank you for your presentation tonight because this is this is great to have sort of a real kind of like formal update because obviously we've been kind of talking here and there and it's good to kind of see holistically what you guys have been working on so thank you for for that first um and thank you to Sam for all her work too um you know I had a question you know in my when I was like prepping for the meeting tonight I was like you know what does energize Ashlin do what are its goals um I'm glad to hear sort of like this education component because um I remember a few years ago we did like our citizen survey and sustainability was like I think our number two like priority that residents had but I think like I don't know if I've said this to you or if I said this to Margie or who I've said this to but I think sustainability is like one of those things that everyone kind of wants but people don't know how to get there MH and I think like for for a Net Zero goal you have to like build it has to be Grassroots it has to it has to be because you have to change Behavior you have to educate people and I'm a marketing and salesperson and I'm going to be the first to tell you it takes like six times to get a message across before people change Behavior like it's it's um it takes a while and so you know really to make a difference you know you were talking about like buildings and transportation for to make changes the the education component is has to be huge because like for instance like one of my neighbors who I adore cut all their trees down in their front yard I think because they didn't yeah I know the fa I know I that's like my face too um because they didn't want to deal with the leaves but it's like how do you educate people now you have to deal with the lawn right so so you know it's um like you know how how do you tell people about getting programmable thermostats so and what the what the rebates might be so people are more likely to change their behavior right so like that Grassroots stuff I think is going to be key because like I I love I love what you guys are doing but like if if you focus only on top down it's not going to be it's it's not going to be successful couldn't agree with you more so you know I I I feel like you know the you know I'm hopeful that the work that energized ashon is going to do in conjunction with the sustain like I I like I'm like hopefully that creates that that that sort of Grassroots effort and and you're right Brandy I think we consistently hear that it's a high priority but the the reality also is with the problem that we're facing it needs to be a marriage off the top Dr down and the grph trps right because something like making changes to uh to to building codes or or doing sustainable development that's not a Grassroots thing that has to be driven by by something like the sustainability committee which which is I think where we are best positioned to to make an impact right or whether it's a public safety building Joe when we work with you right that that's the stuff that has to be done in the ages of something like a Community Committee because you can of have to have that depth of knowledge and and and the time and the effort and you know you also are spending a lot of time you know with with sort of the legislative side of things right um because it sort of has to be done either at the state level or at the Town level but the Grassroots stuff is where I think we've been semi engaged right um you know I'm I'm consistently at at things like farmers markets and and earthy events and all that where I I I absolutely adore speaking to kids and and I get very excited but that takes you only so far right so that's where I do think that having a Grassroots organization like like energized as will will make a lot of difference but again i' I'd rather have them com talk about what their Char is and they should get and like CLA was talking about like they should get plugged into what's happening in our schools and and really I mean honestly like I keep thinking about like the the um the environmental action Club at the high school like those kids should be a huge part of what energized Ashland is and if they're not then it's a m opportunity and maybe like task them or another group or find a science teacher who would want to you know help us become a tree city right um that's an idea well the tree City thing again is something that we have to do as you you would have to do something with it PACE program something you would have to do something with it right but once you get that then actually putting the program together I just when you started talking about administrative help and town resources I mean you have Sam and yeah Becca's our tree Warden I mean and you know I'm looking at kind of Michael here but we do have staff that can help with this kind of I think starting to leverage that uh a little bit more the the kind of support that I was talking about early on is like when you were doing the comprehensive plan for example we actually do have a consultant for example helping you with that with the syain with the with the uh Net Zero plan we really didn't engage you know at that time with with with the with the consultant we have hindsight 2020 right maybe that would have been a good idea we spent a lot of time a whole year doing our own research and putting together the plan now we've now brought that plan and and mapc look at that plan in fact fram's actually been learning from us like we did okay but it took us a year plus to get there we probably could have shortened that I guess my point is so we we are undergoing there's a lot of budget issues I don't know how so I would say one of the things to look at you know what resources you have now and what you can do with it and maybe there's grants or things like that but I would just be careful about you know if if you need a additional administrative support or cost that that's going to be difficult I I appreciate that Rob which is why we haven't come back to we've actually been super conscious about it so as as a committee I don't think we've really come back to you with we need XYZ right if I come back to you this is just me being a little bit uh as as the chair of the committee being a little bit uh reflective on sort of where I think we have successes and where I think we have challenges you know again I'm just speaking truth to you I think that's an area that that we need to do something about if if you ask me right this second where would you want money I'm not ready for that conversation because I want to be a lot more thoughtful about that just quickly add another thing I'd say make sure you're reviewing the The Net Zero plan and and looking at the really significant things and I know that trees are important and I support that whole concept but are we are we doing the other stepbystep things um that are that we went through and have in the net zero plan so that I would just kind of the the the 12 to 24 thing that I showed you those are things that are coming right out of the Net Zero plan and in fact the activities that I showed you are a combination of things that we need to do you know across each one of these elements exist on the net zero plan so I just pulled out the things that are now newterm priority Focus versus things like you know um and I had just excuse me one other question occurred I read the newsletter uh and I remember whenever Source came out with this pilot program for heat pumps and neighborhood networks and we didn't get it the they were supposedly doing the framing are you saying now we actually have an ongoing project to do that yeah so I'm can talk to you yeah that'd be great I mean so we don't have which is the neighborhood I don't so that's the whole question when I applied for it a firm was like Main Street would be great I said don't touch Main Street we're not digging up Main Street for a network Z geothermal anytime soon um but I had just applied for uh feasibility study to see where in Ashland if we did a network geothermal where it could happen we unfortunately didn't get that but we received funding just to do community outreach and education about it um oh which we we just received so I haven't fully thought of how we're going to do how we're going to leverage that but um I think getting just community outreach and education towards it well that's an exciting possibility I think you know definitely and it allows people who can't afford it to have access to it which I think is huge thanks definitely work across departments because if you're looking to get education out obviously Michael puts out his Weekly Newsletter Beth Reynolds through the economic development department puts something out on a regular basis so this is one of those places where we don't want sustainability to work in a silo we want you to work across departments in especially if you're looking to do education it would be a recommendation uh question for one of you and and again this is just me so regarding the tree bylaw it's been discussed that okay it's great that you're looking at this but should we look at working on it as part of the comprehensive plan yeah right so rather than saying okay we're going to create this tree py law we're going to bring it to the town meeting in the fall obviously you've decided not to put it in the spring but as we're having the discussion with the public regarding the comprehensive plan and we'll then have an implementation phase of the comprehensive plan is part of that sust could that be partly sustainability and say okay as as part of our comprehensive plan we're looking at sustainability across all the factors of the comprehensive plan would then a tree bylaw or some other the electrification or things like that be part of the discussion and part of the implementation plan of the comprehensive plan rather than trying to do it now before the comprehensive plan is compl it's it's a it's an excellent question you learn and and and you know Chuck Chuck uh is is on on the comprehensive plan in fact we've got we've got actually a couple of members because Cara who's representing the forest committee also is a member of of my committee so so kind of feel like we've got some representation there um I think there are certain aspects that especially on our longer term road map that are absolutely have to be part of the comprehensive plan so when we think about green zones for example so when when we get into that zoning type of conversation you know I think there was an email today from Michael Kan as well suggesting about you know how should we develop the the rail Transit District right um talking about uh the kind of development that we want whether it's more cluster development or or you know whether it's you know situated around Main Street and and what does that nature look like I think all of those have heavy sustainability implications and I think sort of belong there the reason why the tree bylaw sort of went the direction that it did and I think probably there is some element of it that probably should still happen is um again because of timing more so than anything else we've got maybe we've got some very narrow Parcels left um one of our challenges Brandy very honestly is going to be I think one of our biggest Parcels is that rail Transit District right where where we're going to put the Y and this thing so there's a conversation that needs to happen as to what's more important and then how can we ensure that when we build the Y we reduce and I think aspirationally all of us are going to kind of aim at that and say when we build that thing it should be built in a very sustainable manner so that we reduce the impact right uh of of whether it's the trees or you know building in energy features into it right um frankly part of the goal of doing things like the bylaw is to ensure that that conversation keeps happening right so yes there's a Grassroots conversation that needs to happen sometimes having these conversations whether they go to town meeting or not the fact that we're having the conversation actually puts it back into your minds my mind someone else's mind that this is something important so sometimes we we you know we're going to make that call and kind of say yes this is an important enough discussion to have whether it makes the whether it makes it to the level of yes we have enough support the town meeting or not sometimes it's almost a you know side effect of of that conversation to me the conversation we having is worth it in and of itself right and certainly uh and then then whether we position it as part of the comprehensive plan when we do it I think those are all things that we can we can figure out okay all right good thank you sorry long winded answer but it's good yeah it's good and thanks for bringing them in I think that's timely and so hopefully got I certainly hope that I've answered questions on uh the opt-in code uh and and that that that we'll have an easier time with that yeah just do we anticipate um bringing them back again for the optin code specifically are we think we're probably good with that my my suggestion is like I know last year I think you were here about the same time last year when we had this discussion about the opt-in code and I think I know that there was confusion from our board I know that there was obviously confusion at town meeting um and I know you mentioned you're going to have a public public forum and you're going to just ask for General feedback on stuff but I would be very very clear like how you present that and make sure I think if I remember correctly Steve Mitchell a year ago basically said present like what it means to your average homeowner because because people need to actually get their brain around what that means so if there is no impact to your average homeowner be very clear about that because I think if the more clear you are in a public forum um before you go into town meeting and you hear the the questions that come from that public forum the better equipped you're going to be to to handle town meeting and I would just you know to follow up on that you laid out a very ambitious agenda for your public forums I I think you might want to think about focusing it a bit because you've got only so much time with people and opportunities so it's fair yeah I think but when it comes to the opt-in code this time around at least I don't have to sit there and been passive home and F and hers ratings which which I had to deal with the last time right even even ourselves trying to understand it 45 what 40 doesn't matter it it already applies to us there there three things that we get from the specializ code right now is those three things it's it's three points that's it right okay it's it's as clean as that great well thank you but I would to to be to to bry's point when you do your session on April 6 if you're going to talk about this be very and maybe have two different forms right it looks like you're doing one on a Saturday morning maybe offer one on an evening that's via Zoom that again work with Susan in regards to a zoom account and what you can do because there are a lot of people who might be interested but who may not either have the time or energy or willingness to come to a meeting on a Saturday morning that's good feedback I'll also say the ABA ABA was very kind enough to actually post the conversation I had with them on on YouTube as well so there's a recording available that's effectively talks a lot about this with the people that probably care the most about it so so with any luck I don't think we need to have them back yeah I'm telling you right now I intend to put this there I I we'll support it great all right Lely great thank you thank you everybody that's good of course all right so the next item on the agenda and I apologize this is running really we've been running late but this is I think we're putting these two together the Enterprise funds and the potential increase in the water sewer rates and I see Britney and Dan are here so if you folks just want to come up um when you're whenever you're ready clearing out um you guys wake upar so this is this is one of those things right you plan a certain amount of time for something and those dog hearings just are tricky yeah no I saw the dog hearing you were here for that so you knew I knew so yeah so um we're here to talk about the Enterprise funds and really I think focus on some of the infrastructure needs um associated with those Enterprise funds specifically Water and Sewer to a certain extent uh we're also here to talk about the trash uh Enterprise fund as well so as you know uh you're not unfamiliar with this um Ashland has had a history not just over the last few years but over Decades of really putting off Capital um expenditures Capital Improvements and unfortunately when you do that you have these situations where the bill eventually comes due and they all come due at once and so that is kind of partially some of the prospects that we're facing right now and uh so um Britney is you know taking into account some of those Capital needs has put together a a forecast and then also put together a rate suggestion um which looks at increasing rates um in some cases uh substantially just no shying away from it um so with that I would turn it over to Britney and and Dan Mau everybody I think everybody knows Britney but Dan Mau is our water sewer re Foreman from the DPW um just excellent uh excellent resource for us excellent a excellent member of our staff so right thank you I'm not sure if there's a particular fund you would like to start with or any one of them well maybe a pres I'm not sure you know I I personally am not didn't have much time to really review this and I don't know if people are specific but maybe kind of a general presentation to kind of prep us for uh you know further discussions about this does that make sense I would suggest the water fund because that is so um so comprehensive ensive and we have a tendency to lose steam as the night goes on so um I just I have a short memo to just pass out it's a revised memo just based upon revised from the February 16th one yes it's just based upon new information so okay oh yeah just give them all pass it be easier thanks look at our schedule here so I'm not sure if anyone had the time to read the original memo yes um so obviously in doing the forecast and the budgeting we take into account the usage over the last year we take into account Capital um inflation the developments as best as we can to forecast those in um we don't have the growth that we once had in the past and there's a few developments that are unpredictable we don't know when they're going to come online but we did the best we could with um those assumptions um so the the revised memo that I gave you the recommendation for water would be to increase the rate 21% and that would be a dollar increase to the tax bill of $50 for residents um we're looking at closing a deficit in water of around 4870 for FY 25 so that 21% increase in water would cover that deficit completely just for FY 25 now further on the first page of the memo you'll see that there are just a few options given as to if you increase the rate by 15% it will generate this much in Revenue we could tap into retained earnings this much and so forth there there's a host of different scenarios that we could look at um but just to give you an idea now a Big Driver of that increase is the fact that usage has been down over the last couple of years um we've had a few droughts in the last four or five years that I can remember major droughts um and then we've also had substantial rain in last year in the year before so either people couldn't use water because we had water bands or they didn't have to use water because it was raining so much um so I have noticed that usage has gone down over the last couple of years even with the developments that we've had come online so the usage is down and then also we have a big project that needs to get done which is the ozone project it is a $4 million project and the new information that was received is that hopkington would cover 25% of it probably over the next two years they were confident that they will get reimbursed by them and those two years so that would reduce the borrowing from 4 million to 3 million um then also we initially in the first um budget of water I tried lumping together the water main replacement so we just had to do maybe two big borrowings instead of a few borrowings but just for the rate sake and borrowing sake and timing and workload of the DPW it was best to to still phase them out um so if you have any information on the or questions on the ozone project the big project that's why I have my buddy Dan here to answer any questions you have on any of the capital projects that are in the original memo anyway so Brittney just a quick question I haven't had a chance to but your rate includes uh funding the capital project projects on some sort of schedule or or not yes so there are there are capital projects that are funded within the operating budget itself um on attachment a of the new memo on the FY 25 line the capital is funded at 375,000 and that covers multiple Capital items that's in the previous do cover the big one no so the big one would be a a borrowing so that would cover The Debt Service well that's what I mean so the rate includes the debt Serv yes it does yes that's what I that's what I was getting at yes so then The Debt Service would be factored into obviously the forecast okay and then so would the rate increase so I don't know what's this do do we want to hear from Dan now or do you guys want to talk more about I mean if you have questions on the ozone project I mean the information that we got was very detailed I would say that I wish we had seen the report when it came out in July I mean I think it was mentioned that you might have something um but now having to read that as well as all the other stuff as well as figure this out right um that's the only thing I would say is that had we seen it earlier it would have been good to be a little bit more aware I mean we've been discussing okay we might have to do these projects we might have to do these projects right and what I would say is look looking at your memo it does talk about the deficits going into the the the out years yes what I and I think I saw something about some capital outlay in the out years as well it would have been good to sort of see this again back in the summer as we were talking about last year's budget and even and then going into this year that's my only comment about that project but it looked very detailed about what was needed what the equipment was going to be how you were going to going to do it um I know it's been a while for me since I've been in the Water Treatment Plant part of me almost wants to say okay can we do another tour just to take a look and see and then I think that would be a better way for us to understand and then explain it to the public why this is needed right sure so my question interested in so my question to you is like reading your new attachment a um at the very bottom it's saying there's there's a deficit of 14,870 so that's so we're still running out of deficit that was fy20 I thought that's I thought that was what I was looking at was yeah that was F yeah that was FY 23 actual so we did run into a small deficit in 23 and that was where when usage was budgeted I thought usage was coming a lot more and unfortunately it just hasn't come in the way we thought usage is based so I run a bunch of reports consumption reports and it's based upon the previous year then I also look at a trend okay but it's hard to look at trends when you have droughts and substantial rain and you just have to do your best and hope that Revenue comes in okay so I'm looking at so I'm just a little confused because I'm looking at what was in our packet for Debt Service and there's a bar chart and yep um and I'm trying to reconcile what is for The Debt Service which I assume includes ozone and then the capital outlay is actually less so now for fy2 it's 375 is that so the capital outlay would be funded with cash so that wouldn't be included in The Debt Service chart okay and then also The Debt Service chart would have needed to be updated because that was the original okay Debt Service chart that I put together I didn't um redo the entire memo okay um I just redid it based upon the information that we got from hopkington okay that the IMA was going to be extended and and so because the because hopkinson's going to now be paying a million dollars that Debt Service would look different it would look different so it won't necessarily tie to yeah I just I didn't rerun all of the okay the graph and numbers and all that and just one other question so looking at sort of the trend of the the one was in our packet so obviously it would need to get redone but so is Ozone the only major Capital outl project that we're going to need to because it it's looking like The Debt Service goes up like new get Debt Service so you know I'm thinking you know I you know 21% this year but I'm trying to wrap my brain around like what right what is coming what is coming our way because any add yeah I just you know obviously if yes obviously we have we haven't invested in the in the infrastructure we you know we're also currently under like a um a sewer moratorium and I assume part of that is like looking at what the capacity is and all that other stuff and possibly making more recommendations down the road so I'm just trying to wrap my brain around like what's what's sort of like the immediate need and then what is what is like the longer term Outlook because so if you look at this last page of the new memo last page of new memo okay sorry I'm just it's okay no it's F it's a lot of data and late yeah okay all right so I'm looking at attachment attachment B okay so down below we've tried we were able to push out a few projects such as the um inspection and repainting of the seedar street tank at 1.7 million okay and 27 but that would be a major Capital project um The Pump Station upgrades at 500,000 okay the repainting of the Woodridge tank of 600,000 that we've pushed out for several years now okay um along with the CED distry tank okay the water mains we've been pushing out borrowing for yeah and the ozone is that just came up in the last year okay so the ozone is the priority that has to get done okay we don't have a choice the water mains they've been fixing as they come along yeah and we really should have a a plan a plan yeah and fund it so kind of going along those lines of planning you know kind of longer term more than just you know this year and I and this is great this is awesome like I'm glad like this is helpful um like I'm wondering you know the state and I know I know what the answer to this is going to be but you know the state knows that towns need to replace their infrastructure that we're probably not the only town that has to look at this stuff and I know massworks does like they do massworks grants for these types of projects correct um no Mass no Mass Works does fund infrastructure projects like this um for sure and one of the things that we talked about recently is you know combining some of these projects like water especially the water main Replacements or specifically the water main Replacements with Paving uh you know repaving roads sidewalks and putting it on the tip okay so the tip will not uh tip program that's great yeah it's not soon and it won't pay for the um all of the water stuff but it would pay for like the paving part of this component okay which uh would be a significant cost you know a couple hundred grand probably per if okay so okay I'm just trying to think of like ways that I think that there's grants out there DPW go for them they'll they'll go for for them um any funding source we can get our hands on we can will get okay um hopefully some of the developments move along a little bit faster and I can include them in the forecast okay uh so I don't have necessarily a three or fiveyear plan for the funds it's more so taking it a year at a time yeah kind of like a wait and see and and we are we are looking at different options so for example this ozone replacement we're throwing a Hail Mary pass and seeing if we can get that covered under some the P stuff yeah it's a POS yeah um but we're we've you know preparing that application we hear from Dan uh in terms of these questions I'm good thanks okay Dan I saw I saw I've seen the report and and I talked to Doug after some of the traffic meeting studies that we uh committee meetings we have and it's it's no different than the public safety building I'll compare it to that we've waited and waited and waited in time you you know Band-Aid it Band-Aid it and now it's time to be replaced you know if we did these things you know two or three years ago it wouldn't be half as half as expensive so the town people need to be aware of that it's no different than that public safety building you know so it's either pay me now or pay me later type of deal and I get and there's something that needs to be done we all need water and our ozone treatment uh facility is is vital so it it's it's is not something we can live without so um okay before we I just had some quick questions I'm just curious did you think that Hopkin and wouldn't pay for that for the like what what was that um so at first I was not that I was skeptical it's just that we didn't have I wasal I was pessimistic um we didn't have the I mean you're still using the water right yeah the agreement ended though literally in February of 24 okay and without a signed new agreement and something in writing but well and because they've talked about doing their own they talked about their own treatment you know or connecting with the so and then in their extension they do have um a provision where they can opt out with a six months notice but they have told Ashlin that they're not planning on doing that for about two to three years and this project would be done before then great okay that's good and so that agreement actually will come before this board okay um probably at your next meeting okay because Hopkinson has signed it and I believe Britney correct me if I'm wrong so Hopkinson is looking at going at their town meeting getting an appropriation to support their portion they are from what I know they're looking for to get authorization for um a $950,000 they would have to borrow the money the borrowing right yeah all right and just another quick question when was the last time we raised the water sewer fees I know we it was like two years ago was it last year I will tell you no it was last year but it's it's average over 1% uh a 1% increase over 7 years so you've only raised them twice in the last seven years and that's what it averages out to yeah the last seven years it averaged out to it was a 5% increase in 2023 and then uh so we 2 and a half% increase in 2017 so it averaged 1% over the last seven years and and I remember when we had the discussion last year there was discussion about well we really should be doing more because we have some Capital but we didn't have all the information that that obviously came out last summer we didn't have that last year to make some of these decisions so now having that information where we need to be doing these major capital projects and we just are not we're we're not we're not being being able to pay our bills based on what we're charging so we need to look at changing that you know what might be helpful just to hear from Dan what this ozone project is for people that are watching that haven't had all the the detail that we just I think it would be helpful no that's what I was if you wouldn't mind yeah thank you so so the ozone is is our like primary treatment process at the treatment plant that gets rid of all our iron and magines and it's our first line of defense against any you know bacterias or anything that's bad in the water so that starts the the process and it works very well we we have very clean water coming out of the plant which we didn't have years ago uh prior to the plant being here and the plants set at that 20e Mark where it's life expected is it it's it's reaching the end of its life expectancy and it's just kind of deteriorated um there is a backup process to it but it's not going to be as clean so uh we used to be able to shut the ozone off during the winter months we we could shut it down for a little bit but due to changes in the reservoir we can't do that I don't know if you remember a few years back right around Christmas time November we had a lot of water quality color complaints that was we'd shut the ozone system down for a couple of months like we typically did in the in the in the winter time um and just that little bit of color coming back in from you know the the iron and magines triggered all that because people are used to very clean clear water so our secondary system is a Ferro chloride um it's not as effective you know so so we do have a plan B if if the ozone was to fail completely we can still continue to run the treatment plant but it's not going to be to the level that we can run it with the ozone so and are there byproducts of the of the backup system that aren't there with the ozone system it's just not as effective as stripping everything out of the water that you know all the minerals and and the iron magnes that causes that color complain and iron magnes itself is um more of an aesthetic issue than it is a health issue right I I remember years ago when um when some would roll around and you'd fill your bathtub it would have definitely a very orange tint and at that time I had done research and so um it it it is more of an aesthetic issue than yeah it's required in everybody's diet to have iron and Magan it's not a harmful thing just you don't want it's just not you drink it when you fill up your tub and you get that I get it I remember what's going on yeah if you remember a couple years ago actually um when we actually needed to interject more ozone into the system um we had to turn the system back on we had to yeah excuse me turn the system on during like the winter time so typically in the winter time we were able to shut it off for two 3 months because the clarity because of the temperature right of in the winter time just the nature of the reservoir we didn't get as much iron magnes in our raw water so we were able we didn't have to strip it out but is that related to the temperature of that of the water it seems to me that I remember that it might be and that yes you know is that too a climate change thing there's been a lot of changes up by the treatment plant with you know the development that went up in there that that changed how the waters you know we've had a full reservoir for two years which the eight years that I've been here we haven't had right yeah right you know so a lot of things have changed up there so with that the chemical process we've seen change our raw water has changed we have a lot more iron and magnes in it um so we're going through a lot more chemicals to to get the water to the Quality that we had it before quick question with respect to that the projects that are being done now off of uh High Street house Street in hawton is that affecting uh water the the water supply with some of that runoff coming down into the reservoir okay is there any are you talking about Legacy Farms Legacy farmacy Farms so is there any way of trying to get some funding out of uh the owners of that property as a result of their runoff because yeah we we've looked at that it's you know we have we feel like there's a strong correlation between what's happened there and some of this but scientifically and legally proving that is is a little bit more difficult well in our conservation committee and our conservation agent has been working on this and we've done some orders of um you know conditions and entered into the board actually entered into a settlement agreement with hton with devel this the one over 55 development you're not talking about any others or well this is the the latest or last phase of which I think is I think that is over 5 my understanding from looking at it years ago there's one development right up Hill overlooking the pl the reservoir it's over 55 but there's not others I guess that's what I it's just this one that we're talking about whatever the ones are that are right the street that are right now there there's um some kind of water uh I don't know what you call it to absorb the water there now and redirect it well yes now they've made some run yeah like swes and and different well and those those green tubes that I think absorb water water that's that's just to catch the silk coming in but they've redesigned their detention basins up there to expand them to make them bigger so that they're capable of so the runoff isn't as bad in theory IDE in theory the other day I noticed when I drove down there it there's an area up there it looks like it's set up to just run right down to right I mean there's it's all rocked and everything it's gone from very small tributaries that we could get rain for a couple days and we didn't see anything we have a little tributary that runs underneath the driveway for the treatment plant and we could have rain for a few days we wouldn't see anything come through there now as soon as we get rainfall it it's it's running right well that's not how is that allowed um the the regulations are that you're not supposed to increase that kind of you're supposed to have detention and retention the way the D has has configured our our tier tiers of of uh protection um are are very interesting so they they kind of hug the the street line in one Direction and the other direction they go out like you would expect them to so how much of what we're talking about is due to this development I mean that's my are we are we increasing our rates or doing more capital investment because these guys built that thing there and we didn't control it properly the ozone effectively just in its nature it inherit nature it's eating itself up because it's it's doing its job so after 20 years of doing its job it's it's just we have a bunch of little pin holes and all the piping where the leaking out we've kind of put Band-Aid repairs on that's like a regular expected operations and maintenance it's just that's expected um though it though it sounds like what's going on in the winter where you can't turn the ozone off anymore correct that could be climate change additional water in this Reservoir things like that and like Michael had said that that's it's one thing we have our data that shows Everything's changed but try and prove that in a court I mean it's just well I think I think well at least for me I think it's important to know what we're considering that is potentially due to this development so we can at least understand and it's late now but I mean I've been concerned about this development and how it got allowed and how it's we're basically paying for it and asked the residents to pay for it and I think it'd be useful to know what of all this is potentially due to that and review our Avenues of action I I think we want to be careful though right I think the understanding that yes we're seeing some impact but my understanding is the ozone system is 20 years old well that's that's not part of that's not and that's the major part I mean I think in regards to I mean unless we're having to use more chemicals and that's why our price needs that's why that's why I think it'd be useful to have that in like what is what is potentially due to this and what is it I mean I think this is outrageous I think to your point Rob that the question really is longterm what's going to be the impact of that development and the runoff cuz we're asking people to pay for it I mean why are we in that position me the ozone we have to do anyways I think that's clear right but but in the long run what what is this runoff potentially going how it's going to impact our water all the capital work that we're proposing that's that has no effect this is this is stuff that has been getting kicked down the road for years this this is not a legacy Farm is so I just just to repeat I just think it'd be good to segregate what's kind of regular long-term capital and and what's cost potentially associated with this development well as Dan just said none of it none of thisone of these Capital see additional operations costs in chemicals and extended runtime with the filters and stuff like that so that'll creep up on us over a period of time but that's not the capital that we're okay well I'm not just talking I'm talking about costs in general that we're passing on and that's what I want want to see you know what what is the impact of this thing and what should action should we be taking that maybe we're not taking you know as a result of that because I think we have that responsibility so let me ask a question so are you like do you it sounds like this is something that's going to start in fy2 as soon as sort of the budget as soon as we get funding we're moving forward okay so from a timing perspective and a next steps for us um are we okay not voting on this tonight I think I would absolutely because because I think the conversation's good and I think but I'm I'm not comfortable yet like taking a vote yeah we're not asking for that not on the agenda but I just wanted to make sure like from from your perspective that that wasn't something that you guys it is a good point though what what is our kind of timeline for this so what do we thinking about in terms of future agendas and decision points I guess well um I I think you know what is the the pleasure of the board here I mean we could certainly 2026 no the first meeting in June Rob yeah that's a good so or second meeting in May um you know if you have your answers and everything and you feel I don't want to say comfortable because none of this is comfortable but feel like you're ready to make a decision we could do it as soon as the next meeting um I think we need to put out some I think we need to put out some some education Ed motion to go past 10 God yes second all those in favor of going past 10:00 is just a Grimace look all right so we're going past 10 yeah but um so Britney so you need to know before we send out the first you know the first bills for fy2 right and I mean we would I was need a decision before town meeting um yeah I I mean I think I think I think our next meeting we you know I what I would I mean I need to look at the updated memo that you've given us and if you could update some of the other attachments sure that you didn't get to do with this one and let us have those to look at and then to Rob's point if there's a way to look at what are the what are these long-term capital costs that are related to just general maintenance that we know we need to do and what are some of the other costs and expenses that we think could be attributed to the change in the input coming into the reservoir from Legacy Farms and how is that impact and then I mean I don't know where we're at with the the um IMA with Hopkinton but is there I don't know if we can go to them or to the developer and say our costs are increasing can we get additional funding or can you supplement something I don't know if that's possible something to work I'll have to go back and review it because uh Lisa did cover this extensively with the board a couple years ago when you entered into the settlement agreement right and um I'll to see what that covered I believe there was some chemical related costs associated with that Dan I'm not sure what the exact it would be good to but there was some mitigation that that they still haven't completed that correct if you could remind us what that was that we sure uh another final question for me anyway is Dan this ozone project Does it include updating the backup system I've already actually I've gone through the backup system this this past summer to make sure it's all up to Snuff it's everything's where exactly where it needs to be so if it has to go we're good going thank you appreciate that good so our next meet is March 20th in two weeks right um are we thinking going toil I think you're April 3rd maybe is that well as long as gives us enough time from a budget perspective and getting the budget out and approved oh you're right yeah pretty um I mean yeah March we're already a few weeks behind anyway so March 20th would probably be great if you need a little bit more time then April 3 I can hustle and get the document together um but April 3rd might be better but um if you need April 3rd if if you need April 3rd but we can give you we can work on getting the information I mean my my feeling is the sooner we can get this information and make this decision and talk to the public about it the better and then more information is the best educating the people they need to know how are you thinking of educating them well the other thing is if we just we can if we can have the new updated information for our next meeting and as part of that meeting have a little further discussion about what some of these costs mean to the public and then either not do a vote and wait to vote until April 3rd so we can talk about this and get some input from the public that might be a good way to handle it what do people think about that I think it's the right idea and Michael could put it in his newsletter about you know potential you know increases and he has the information to help you with and my other recommendation for you when you're working on the budget is plug in your recommendations and as as you're working on the budget that would be my you know yep yeah a couple just another thing I think actually would be helpful maybe for the board but certainly for the public at large is um you know put together a brief presentation with visuals like I noticed in some of the reports from Woodard and Curran and Weston Samson that they had some pictures of Our Own Zone um filter so you know a few pictures of that a few pictures of the water Ms I mean how many water main breaks do you average on a on a month you know got plenty of and a little history too about you know that there really has been a a um you know small very small minor increases in recent years I mean I do think when we talk about kicking the can down the road I mean that's on us and also you say it costs you more yeah it does well it's on but it's on us Joe I mean yeah we wait to do stuff but it's on it's on us if we're last just last year that was just last year but the years before that we didn't and and I would say too like not only like showing the um the increase in water rate which is you know obviously What the residents are paying but also what we've spent in Capital Improvements in the water infrastructure because it's needed it's needed yeah and drinking water you know you you don't you don't mess with you don't mess with drinking water you don't mess with public health so the other part that I found interesting in this there was a map that just showed and I'm I'm not finding it in the packet right now there was a map that showed I think sewage and stuff that had been worked on as well as water Ms and things that had been worked I mean the list was unbelievably detailed but yeah so there's these maps that were provided in our packets the sewer system map and I think it was the water sewer system map maybe they're all just sewer system Maps when you were talking about the sewer um and it I forget exactly what detail was on it but it's pretty intensive our sewer system and our water system and our pipes and and I think sometimes we don't consider that so I think to to Claudia's Point some history about how old some of our pipes are and why we're needing some of this capital and infrastructure and okay so for the next meeting do you want it more in like a presentation format this is this is a lot of data analysis that if you put in presentation it's not going to be it's going to be boring but maybe visuals and um some other stuff and give us and the public pictures as to to you know as as Brandy always says as a marketing person right you got to tell them the story okay and the fact that we did a a 5% increase last year but we hadn't done one before that for a a number of years and over the last seven years we've only been doing a 1% increase and as we know things have been going up and the the discussion that you had about we're not getting in as much because there's not as much usage and and development development SEL there's a lot there's a lot of factors so I think showing us and the public that picture is important I think there's a lot of research around pictures too and people M based on a picture versus yep one of and actually I think one of Britney's most impactful graphs is showing that the reason we've been able to keep rates so low and not raise them is because we've deferred our Capital expenses over the years um that would we've had a declining Debt Service we've had the developments over the past couple of years help us out so we've only had to it was on average that we increased rates 1% yeah I mean do you want to it all depends how you look at it do you want to raise rates 3% every year to pay for projects in the future that way it's not a massive jump like it is now or do do people want to wait and projects as they come do and I think that would be part of our discussion right that point too in terms of Enterprise funds um what do we have to we can only raise the amount that it costs to run whatever we're running via the Enterprise fund is that how that works no I mean you can raise you can raise rates more and generate more Revenue that so that at the end of the year you would have a balance that would then go back into what you call retained earnings so is there a cap on that or how's that what are you thinking about they recommend um they've changed it but they recommend to have at least 90 days worth of operating expenses in retained earnings but then say they also throw in well it also depends on your Capital plan right so they kind of protect themselves by saying cash for right if you have a lot of capital investment you need to do the more retain earnings you should have so they don't really tell you you know y wondering if if we have you know projects like the ozone right and you know that that that has to be done every 20 years and maybe that one's a little bit out there but you know maybe you know you start raising a little bit of money so that you know just like you save for something you want to buy right I mean you don't you're not always in the position to do that we've all probably known that from our personal Liv kind of kind of sneak up on your and and this doesn't seem like it would be the year to be looking to retain funds but maybe the future you know who know we may have a dry season this year and that means more people are going to use more water so mix you need a mix and then you need no water bands that's exactly it's like a no win up here you know either you're either in a water band or we have substantial rain damn if you do damn we still need to do trash too but this is this is just water there still sewer in trash all right you can thank you guys read I would say sewer can hold off as well maybe include it as part of the presentation okay next at our next meeting because I think they tie together to some extent okay now what do you want to do that make sense yeah I think we're I think trash trash you want pictures of trash talk trash we just did the trash bags that's how I know the unfortunate thing is that only covered one year and what I have noticed this year and obviously it hasn't been a full year is that the bag sales like I worried about are not coming in as expected so right now I'm projecting a $100,000 shortfall just in the bag sales now that could be due for a number of reasons we don't know if people hoarded the bags well thanks Dan apprciate you um yes what okay as long as okay so now I know that there'll be there'll be an influx of purchases the next year H right so there could be people could go out and buy a ton more bags next year and sales will be back up to where they should be I just don't have the data to analyze it yet right um so that's why I I did the hybrid approach again is to a flat fee and a um I'm not putting it solely on the flat fee what I would like to do it's reliable and we don't have hoarders that so I have a couple questions for you yes um so as we were looking at like the whole the whole trash um the way we we currently price it there's one fee for household another fee for seniors yes would it be possible because I know as I'm I'm like it pains me like literally pains me to raise the flat fee for everyone in the same manner yep and I get that the seniors are some of them are especially are on a fixed income but there are a lot of other people in our town that are also on fixed incomes and that are struggling it would it be possible instead of doing an age cut off for like levels payment to do something that's income based like is that like even a doable option because I feel like that that like a financial hardship it's a financial hardship I looked at I talked about that last year because again there are many seniors who can afford higher prices and I basically was shot down I just feel like if there's a way to do it where it's not necessarily to make seniors at the same rate as everyone else but to look at to look at some sort of income abatement versus Senior abatement I'm just I'm thinking it from a staffing level and into who would review all that who would obtain all the documentation I know I know that's why I'm asking that's why I'm asking I just what comes to mind what do you collect tax returns I mean I know that's no I know I know what do you collect know I just I just feel like certain things though right know I mean there are there are some of our programs that are financially related right some of the school stuff right you you get free and reduced or you get certain things because of your financial situation that that information is known by certain individuals and certain not not well free and reduced actually for families is is used for a lot of things in the schools it's used for um bus fees and other things as well so it might be something that you know what's the information Source um yeah but there's a you know significant staff I mean we have one staff person for it's a great idea there are standard ways of doing it but imp might a little bit I know that's why I'm asking the question might wind up being more expensive than we say or that we than you know and and the other thing then there is that means that how do you determine you know what's the income level that you give a discount to and then you have to figure out okay Above This income level we're going to be charging more and you got to figure that out and you have to have I mean I think there's I know it's it's it could be like opening up the most biggest can do you do it by assets you have yeah no I assets that are in there kids names now there's a whole I just can think about it I feel like there there may be other ways to kind of slice and dice it maybe but I don't I don't want it to be like this humongous project either where it yeah where it becomes like a nightmare to implement and a nightmare to manage but you know I'm looking at like the the discrepancy between what were potentially what the proposal was to like increase our trash fees for this next year for for like a standard household and then what it is for a senior and I'm like but I know there's lower income families that right you know that so there are argument last year was there's higher income seniors that can afford to pay it yeah right and they're getting the discount because of their age and yeah yeah there are different ways to generate the revenue that we need so I had um recommended the 15% for the I call them regular people and then a 10% for uh seniors yeah and then a 15% increase for the bag fee yeah but you could do 20% for the regular people and 5% for the seniors or there's so many different options to do it's Britney one of the things that I was thinking about when I was looking at it was um you know when we when we purchased bags right I I you know I actually do have somech them in bulk 30 33 cents know we don't B cases and we sell them at a little yeah um that's so my my children do come to our house get bags but they they get them for free the children now but um if if we um you know when we look at bags because there's a there's a cost associated with it right so every time I go out and buy a bag some of it does come back to the town so it's like 30 cents or 3 to see how much it is actually comes back to town it's the retailer keeps 33 so it's it's so that's a loss so you know part of me wondered if we're trying to make up $116,000 which is you know the number right that you were um for trash I think it for that was the bag number I think yeah I know it was it was it was $116 that would be yeah go ahead produced by yeah was 100,000 was the revenue for the bags okay the additional Revenue so that comes to like $19 in change if across 5,000 households so at some point you know if I'm going to pay the additional 30 cents 40 cents for the bag then I might be better off paying depending upon how many bags I'm buying right I might be better off paying an additional $20 in the in the flat rate or not $ you know I just wondered where's the yeah from I mean from a financial standpoint purely a the flat fee is just a more reliable and stable source of income yeah that's just that's my that's my opinion um part of it doesn't incentivize people to recyc and things like that but just from a revenue standpoint it's just a it's a little bit more reliable and we are already incentivized to some degree this would be an additional incentive these these raises but I just wondered if maybe we should kind of look at what the Tipping Point is there in terms of um you know if we if we looked at just adding the additional $20 to the flat rate leaving the bag prices the way they are I would love to do that I would love to just increase the flat rate and but you should love it okay but you know if it so because if you figure if it's 75 bags and you know I I can't I did actually do it out in terms of how many you know um at that increase at what point does it would it just be better off to take the 20 bucks and give it right to the flap yeah I mean I don't know well I'm I'm interested and and like I remember last year when when Doug was here talking about the whole trash situation and um one of the things that he was talking about and correct me because I don't know these things that well but I think there's like two components of of the fees from waste management there's like I think like a tonnage I don't know so there's like the amount of trash that people are throwing away and then there's I think it's like a tipping charge or whatever it is to send out the the trucks to the to the so that's that's like your hauling charge okay and then what you're talking about in terms of the actual cost of disposing the rubbish that's called a tipping fee okay all right so I was sort of right yeah okay so so I'm curious like the like the the less bags does that mean that people are throwing away less trash because I'm trying to I'm trying to understand what the behavior is yes so I had I had a feeling that someone would ask that tonight and I I wasn't able to get the data in time um that's where I'm not sure if people were holding the bags okay but the tonage has stayed the same okay or if tonage has actually gone down okay so I can request the information from waste management and and see if that be the tonage has gone down if if not then because because I think that's going to also Drive some of our decisions because like when we raised both the flat fee and the bags last year it part of you like you said it's like it's it's not s like it's not a depend the bag fee is not a dependable so maybe people like I asked I asked Sam today last night I actually I sent her an email as I was going through all the trash stuff I said how many households do we have composting because ideally not from a revenue standpoint but like from a holistic sustainability world persec to s that composts a discount on their TR right because that incentivizes people to do the right thing yep um if like Waste Management would work with us and charge us less for the tonnage or tipping fee whatever it is I would love to be able to do that obviously that's doesn't solve the revenue issue yeah we could look to see if I don't know if it's if we have this many less bags what that correlates to in the tonnage is it a dollar dollar for match there's a bunch of different so like I asked Sam I said so how many households compost in Ashlin today versus a year through Black Earth compared to a year ago because when we raised the fee like did did that incentivize people to to compost to compost and the numberb she gave me so a year ago it was 208 families in Ashland and um now we're at 292 which doesn't sound like a huge number jump but when we're talking percentage it's a big percentage so like I'm thinking okay you know Behavior might be shifting you know and Sam was talking about oh you know I'd love to be able to offer grants and like all this other stuff but there's other things that are kind of taking priority on those grants that we had offered through through through the inial just I do want to note but that's that's just people compost through that program correct right so I use less bags because I compost we put out a bag every two weeks I don't I'm not in that program we've been composting for 30 years in your backyard yeah which there must I would think a lot of people I'm sure there are other people that I mean I know people who compost in their I'm just saying discount but black Earth takes a lot more out of the the food stream than than because you can put meat you could put bones Dairy I know but it's still a lot I mean it's definitely like the way to it's the way but you verif okay here's my invoice from Earth $10 off of my does the town get any revenue from Black Earth no so so there's no savings to no I mean what we were able to negotiate as part of a a program a a pilot program was a reduced rate for residents to to join and be a part of the Black Earth Pro program but no we don't get fin to meet a certain number and now we've met that amount so it's at the lowest rate possible yeah yeah if we made some kind of money off of it then un hit 900 900 households between the combined Community to to to lower the price more okay and we're not there I I thought it was just the 500 was the mark okay no so but you know like I'm wondering like would we be able to I don't know negotiate negotiate with with Waste Management based on like the fees like that they charge for for tonnage like I I'm just trying to I'm trying to figure out like ways that we can look at this and kind of have a better picture of what's going on yeah I I mean I think certainly when the contract comes up again that's an part of the discussions that we can have we did try to get we did look at townwide composting as part of the last contract and it was just prohibitively expensive yeah um and you're talking about like the doubling of the costs well presume we're saving because they charge us Less on the the tonnage right I mean the more we yeah but the hauling and the specialized you dispos that's you need that anyway one other thing that I know that we kind of mentioned the last time around with this and I would kind of like to take another look at it too is we had mentioned if we went to a a um bi-weekly recycling so it wasn't every week you fill up the big bin but every other week um what what that would translate into to as far as possibly like stabilizing the the that's a good the trash c talk about that and then you know obviously we'd want to like make sure like if we would make some sort of change like that you know maybe we do a survey out into the public and just say hey if we move to every other week on a scale of like easy to excruciatingly painful how bad would it be for you and see what people I don't know like I'm just trying to think of some creative ways that we may not be able to yeah these new compost bins are very large I think for most people they could gole bins yeah yeah so most people can go to I think you know well I think the trash contract's up in June 30th of 2027 so we'll probably start negotiating that in late 2026 so that's certainly something we can bring up I think what we want to be concerned what we should be concerned about is that if that is going to discourage people from Recycling and then they start putting more of their recycling into the waist stream which then we have to pay for and end up paying more for so like if somebody fills up their recycling bin within week one you know at week two what are they doing are they actually taking their Recycling and putting it into well that information we can get from the you know waste folks now is is how much you know how much do people recycle so that we can because then maybe we could figure out well how much room is there in you bin every week you know everybody's most people's bin full or they most people have full or something I would think they're tracking on a week toe basis what they're hauling for us right yeah it's usually the invoices are done on a monthly basis right but they should but to do that they're still tracking it week by week what they're hauling so I would expect we can get a report from them on a week by- week basis as to what they're taking for recycle and what they're taking for trash we can ask and look at that and say okay okay through the month it's consistent or I mean I know for ourselves sometimes either we forget to put it out or it's like okay we're busy too busy or whatever we don't even put out the recycle or we don't put out the trash and then the next week our recycle bin is a little bit Fuller but yeah maybe there are other people or it would be good to see I have a teenager responsible for taking out the trash so we occasionally miss it sometimes I don't have that excuse but suppose family size really I guess start times of the year too come Christmas and we got of Amazon being Del to our house every day those boxes add up just christas depends whether not you have somebody that cuts the boes up into the right right that's definit that is not me yes go as do we I step on them that's I I guess what I'm hearing and maybe you too is that if we could have some kind of understanding of what our usage is from a trash perspective y the T like the tonnage and and how is that impacting Us in the charging and stuff like that yep yeah I'll see if the since the bag Revenue did go down quite a bit yeah see if it's impacting tonnage to go to Claudia's house yeah if it's not yeah you we did buy a lot ourselves all right so two out of five that's my yeah okay all right so for me personally just you know like when I saw the trash fee proposal literally I like was like yikes because we just went to this like you know the the the the two payment thing which is okay except that the the second trash fee like came at the exact same time excise tax you know just got them yeah came out and and it's I just paid my water bill like so it's it's all kind of you're getting hit every yeah so not I mean I I get it from a revenue standpoint we need to balance our budget and we need to to be able to pay for things like trash the twice a year was really just to give people a break to not do it all at once I wouldn't mind if it was all at once just because it gives people longer to actually pay the bill cuz it kind of trickles in I'm I'm wondering then based on what bry's saying right the the second bill came around the same size as time is excise tax and what you know so and it also looked like in your report that we hadn't gotten as much payment like we're not our our receivables are off based on the two Bill process yeah so the flat fee I I obviously don't really have a trend to look at and when I looked at the previous years it took people about six months or seven months to to pay the bill the first three to four months we collected everything right but people know they have all year to pay or they they take a little bit longer right so now that it's in two installments I don't know if people going to pay now in July or August which will throw off our cash flow now for that fiscal year and I just I don't have the data to to look at so that might be something to check with the public right okay we did two bills because we increased the amount was that helpful or not or should we even if we know we're going to increase a little bit again this year I'm expecting does it make more sense to just keep it as one bill yeah it's right I mean we can ask that question maybe that's a town manager yeah Pi a month of hits yeah I think it was it was summertime so people usually in a good mood in the summertime anyway so that's usually that's a good I mean I think people just look at the bill and pay it I mean you know yeah right right but okay it may be better to yeah okay anything else we need to cover at this time are we ready to move on I think we can move on if you want to unless you want to just endure keep talking about it yeah yeah so we're going to discuss some more next meeting and potentially take action the meeting after okay well thank you Britney and thank you Britney thanks thank you Dan thanks for hanging in there all right and so thanks for the water yes thanks for the water yeah all right the next is the uh discuss the MBTA zoning which I think we we do have a date for the um meeting with the planning board is uh and what's the time on that 8:30 8:30 we do because the consultant's coming in later or something all right Joe do you want to talk to us about it yes I guess I shouldn't have asked okay yeah actually nothing has changed yeah um the figures are there and the figures are is it in our packet I didn't see no no I the figures of what we presented at our last our last one okay at the same they they haven't changed so that that's basically it great so thank you for that work questions or thoughts on that um oh I was I have not had a chance to either watch The Forum or review the information so I'm hoping we'll because we haven't been sent anything formally yet right no regarding that okay but we will before Hope a week from we will before Thursday I would hope so okay okay and um yeah and we did have a discussion of that not too long ago and I don't know wpp up some stuff yeah is 8: or 830 80 8:30 so but the public forum was great like I just wanted to to to thank you guys for putting putting together a couple Forums on this because I think part of the part of the issue is really educating people um it's funny I listened just as an FYI I listened to an NP um broadcast um they were interviewing the person that was from Milton that was the head of the no for h no for a no for Milton um and you know just as an FYI for anyone that that is listening um the the no for Milton folks had always intended to comply with MBTA communities but it was the way that it was presented and put together that was the issue which is how it ended up a ballot issue so the other thing the other thing that I heard on so I was on mapc winter Council today and they were talking about housing and the MBTA zoning yeah and someone from Milton was on it and they said the issue is not necessarily the housing but the fact that we are being impacted by this but the transportation the trains that we're having to house for are not consistent and they're not providing the transportation that our community needs so people are still having to drive in from Milton so you're requiring us to do this Transit MBTA Zone Zing because of the trains but the trains do not provide they have two really old they're like we that's what the person said you know what but I just wanted to put that out there because I know some of the feedback that had happened at the Forum yeah and in general why they said no people are using it as sort of this rally and cry like oh we should be like Milton and we should say no and it's like well it's actually first of all it's complicated like everything else is um but you know I just wanted to say thank you to all the work that you guys have been doing because I think that what from what I saw at your last Forum um The Proposal really has minimal when I say minimal like zero additional impact from whatever has been currently built or currently permitted and so the impact that we are well like so you know being able to control what we can control I think is there and I think that the the public work that you guys have been doing has been great so I just want to say thank you well on behalf of uh trishan L and Peter you're welcome it's a it's it's been an experience and um you know we're just waiting for ugc to see what the heck's going to happen with that piece of property you know we put it in it's in the it's in the plan but do we have to take it out yeah we that's actually something I I want to take a little bit of a closer look at um and because if we're going to change the density of that lot I don't know if Peter brought this up my concern up to you but um at your last meeting but you know if we increase the dens the density outside of what is allowed in the development agreement does that basically Al derail at the rail Transit District um that ugc project okay so that's something I think we've got to be careful about the other the other thing is we got an some of us not all of us got an email from Mike Kane um after the ABA Forum that happened and he said if we're looking to create new housing and and different things let's try to work with the MBTA he said the parking lot at the MBTA could be a potential area for building right you put garage underneath you do so I I think part of what we need to do is get creative with this as well where Did We End well I wasn't I didn't see the form but I'm going to try where is it on wacka like you can just look it up so I'm going to try to look at it but I always like the idea of zoning around the TR close to the train station so that's not a bad idea the other the other thing too is that um if people uh aren't part of that resoning District we in on the Pleasant Street area they can always use the uh downtown uh overlay dist uh District as part of that because that allows commercial building and housing and housing so that's already there so we don't need to reinvent the wheel through special permit right through a special permit correct well the zoning though the MBTA zoning has to be by right exactly yes EXA okay all right so certain age too so if you don't have the acor that's that's important okay well thanks Joe and thanks all the other folks so next Thursday you know Michael I'm thinking maybe um in your newsletter send a link to those two forums they were very informative we did I would do it again's put them out there because they were very good forums and people could fast forward through actually yeah just at this next meeting we're going to actually vote right and finalize this or finalize is it going to town meeting right yes I I think you're going to get a recommendation so we're going to make a recommendation or clearance for and then and then the planning board probably has to hold a separate hearing anyway for because it's a bylaw change so they would have to go through the whole town meeting Z yeah zoning hearing process that's yeah I mean you might they have that laid out I mean you may choose to push that to um you know push this vote to the fall I mean that's a decision that you know you could certainly make as well I don't see yeah right that's the that's the other option what that that it's if we can do it in the spring and if for some reason it doesn't pass at Springtown meeting it would give us the opportunity to revisit it in Fall town meeting to make it happen I think we're a good position to go for spring yeah okay all right thank you um the next item I have is discuss and vote on determination of the useful life of the fire department Town truck and authorizing a clerk to sign on behalf of the board so is there anything we need to discuss here you have to have some so so so typically typically uh you know fire trucks you're only allowed to borrow over a period of five years and so what this does is would change that to be 20 years it has to be done by a vote of the board though and what is it but this is something we voted on two years ago at town meeting to purchase the truck correct have we not borrowed for it yet um it's under no we have not borrowed for it yet it's still under construction it takes about 2 years for them to okay to be built so they're building a truck and we haven't paid we haven't paid anything on it yet correct oh we're good for it you think so by taking by taking this vote we'll then uh we'll do borrowing for it but by allowing us to do this we can borrow for 20 years 20 years so we increase the depreciation in effect yeah in 20 years is a realistic time I guess 20 years is a very realistic time frame and so you just need well it would be Joe but you need to actually take a motion okay so I'm going to read read the whole thing no just that you can you want to read this make the motion okay um I move that we authorize that the maximum useful life of the first to the fire tower truck to be financed with the proceeds of the 1,435 N8 borrowing authorized by the vote of town meeting passed May 4th 2022 is hereby determined pursuant to General Law chapter 44 sub7 uh one to be 20 years I'll second that the motion's been made and second it all those in favor say I I oppos None motion passes unanimously the clerk will sign it very good you all right um okay so believe it or not we're just getting a town manager report oh yeah I got a long list tonight I know I see that you do so um so first I I'll start off with an update on the FY 25 budget I I don't have too much of an update except I did have an opportunity to sit down with superintendent Adams and just kind of talk about kind of the situation that we're facing with the deficit and just kind of get a feel of where the school committee and the superintendent is uh on their budget because they're also in negotiations at this point in time um with the number of their unions and uh so it was a good discussion they're planning on holding their um budget Workshop that believe' on the 16th um so they'll have more information after that and then once we have that figure from them we can really start working on whittling down that deficit um so that's the update on fy2 so if they're doing their budget workshop on March 16th then you and Jim will work stuff out and then we'll have a tri board meeting to discuss and review or I will suggest that we have a tri board meeting okay so for sure um but yeah I mean whether it's at a tri board meeting or whether you folks are reviewing it as individual boards and committees we'll have a plan you know that we would put together for you to review um the next item on the agenda is at technology efficiencies so if you recall um not to too long ago Paul Carpenter was able to secure a grant through the community compact program for $150,000 to pay for a new permitting system now this is going to be a comprehensive permitting system that we're going to be able to utilize across all different departments so not just building but also planning Health um even our liquor licenses and the licenses that happen out of our office DPW the clerk's office so we'll be able to um to do that we'll also be able to accept payments online as part of this which is something that we've been looking to do to increase the convenience for um for people permit for permits and stuff um so we uh we made a decision to go with a company called open gov and uh you've probably you might have seen advertisements for them around they're certainly expanding and and capturing market share here in Massachusetts um but um we're in the process of working out an implementation plan with with them and that should be done and completed by July 1st so looking forward to that and then also um we're looking at making some uh efficiency upgrades in our internal um internal technology if you will uh utilizing some of the HR mod modules available in munus so one is a time and attendance model employee um I forgot what they call the second one do you remember what the second one it's some Tyler cont Tyler content management that's what it is um so Katherine's been working with Paul and munus on that so um we're going to be making making some that was something that you reviewed during the budget Workshop that Katherine talked about so are we trying to implement it before the end of this year because we have some funds to do that or are you putting it into the budget for fiscal year 25 we'll put it into the budget for 25 and it'll be an ongoing cost as well right I knew that so okay so that'll have to be part of the budget okay correct um but it should save us um you know if it doesn't save US Dollars it should make us a lot more efficient in terms of the usage usage of our time okay um so there's that um next is a comprehensive Plan update so first I want to just you know let everybody know out there that there are three specific ways that you can provide input um one is a survey and another is a crowd map uh both of which you can find on The Envision Ashland website it's part of the the website has a pretty extensive address uh I did find if you just Google inv Vision Ashland it comes up as the first uh first one on Google um so that should help you uh we have our next meeting tomorrow uh tomorrow night the library it is at the library starting at 7 p.m.

and we'll review kind of our community engagement process or progress I should say to date um and I know several of us have hosted meetings in a box and have been able to get some input so it's pretty U um pretty pretty good Outreach effort um also so just moving on to the next one the Dei update so there has been a community survey that's been put out um and so we're continuing to advertise that um in fact tonight I sent something out or I scheduled something um that went out that had the survey link to both the comprehensive plan and the Dei survey um and both of those were in both um English and Portuguese so is that like via constant contact via Constant Contact so so what would be good is at our next meeting if you can go back and see how many how many you know what was the open rate and what was the clickthrough rate so we can see potentially how many people are actually looking at it yeah we should we should get the number of surveys completed and see if there's a a spike that happens with that too um so that's the Dei update we also have we have a meeting tomorrow um to go through that um to that work so next is an update on 2024 goals now you know I have a spreadsheet that I that I usually distribute um it didn't get updated by everybody in time so will be able to send that to you I'll send it to you in between me maybe we'll have more time next meeting to go over it yeah well and we can look at that as we're doing your review correct yeah correct so let's let's think about it as next meeting agenda so funny Joe I I think in April when could I mean as we're each doing our review of him then right that first week in April we're going to be meeting with him so yeah and then I don't have too much on priority project update from the last meeting so um except uh you know the upper Charles well I did give a pretty pretty comprehensive overview of where we are with the last upper Charles Trail group so yeah we need to have another meeting but yeah yeah and so uh that's what I have for this evening great I think that's enough yeah yeah so that gets us to board report so we we're star in the usual way Claudia if you're ready to go uh yeah I don't have too much I did attend attend the uh planning board uh MBTA Forum which was very informative and uh recommend uh people take a look at those videos okay thank you Randy I also don't have very much um and I can't think of anything because it's really late so I'm gonna I'm gonna take a pass on tonight but yeah I know I don't have anything else to say I'm done Joe go ahead he's got a whole sheet of stuff stuff yeah well don't forget wasn't there for the last meeting so so he's making up for last real quick that helps uh Public Safety uh we met at the public safety building uh with our roadway Traffic Safety Committee on the 27th a lot of items were discussed as a matter of fact I'll I'll pass around the fact that Evan White uh was uh spoke uh had conversation with Mass DOT and they plan on uh putting in two pedestrian crosswalk signs uh AC not Sol even though this is a Soler powered uh design but on on codal road which is a state roadway um so oh yeah I've been seeing the work yeah so at some point we're going to need to accept that those those two uh signs and uh at some point we'll be responsible for the maintenance I talked with Doug Small about that and uh to run those two signs uh when needed because it's it's one of those push buts like we have downtown uh he is like about 12 cents a day it averages out to 12 cents a day he says and I can cover that into my budget so that's not a real big deal so uh that would be uh that would be suggested but seeing this not on the agenda hopefully we can put it on the next one yeah get make sure you remind us make sure you remind us well she's going on way vacation she should be in bid by now because she's traveling Oh is [Laughter] she yeah right yeah all nighter Joe this is great work I think we should put spend some time on it we can do that and and the other thing is too I I it's running real quick Mertle Street by Winter Street there's a gate we have no idea who authorized that gate to be put up I know that it was there because because of uh when those houses went in when the houses went in well prior to the houses when people were dumping trash and stuff in that area yeah then the houses would in and became like a a crazy you know cut through but if we to make that a one way and that would be people coming in from Framingham to utilize that and not coming out because you got a blind spot there so we're looking at that and changing that around and open up the gate for that so that would keep the traffic from uh strob SL from so maybe since you have something for us to vote we invite the road set Traffic Safety Committee to our oh be either next meeting or our first meeting in April to just give us an update and then also vote that we can actually do that that that would be great make a note make make a note of that and tomorrow night uh at 5:00 with the affordable housing trust uh will be meeting and again I want to thank the board for supporting the uh habitat for uh uh Society uh for that affordable housing uh program and uh lastly my condolences to the families of uh Marie oliv and Beverly Kenny uh very wonderful people who uh starts uh supporters of the uh Council on Aging they were always there on activities and stuff and I miss their smiling faces and they were the only two that could still call me Joey uh but uh they were wonderful people and lastly Ben Montenegro who was a stellar figure in in Ashland for many many years his son Peter just passed away uh he had a battle he had a battle with cancer 8 years and uh God bless him and his family and I just wanted send out my condolences to them all we lost a lot of good people recently so uh keep them in your prayers and thoughts and that's all I have great thank you I just jump back in um I just wanted to mention that and I meant to send you Michael a picture but uh last week I saw them working on um uh a some new um crosswalks on 135 um and they were out there uh risking their lives painting as I was coming out of one of the streets and uh so I did take a little picture and I just want to say it was uh you know great to see that work happening and uh how much I appreciate the DPW and uh friends we're working on it and hopefully the sidewalk plans are still go for it and March 10th pancake breakfast VFW with the Boy Scouts true starts at 8 o' March 10th March 10th it's a Sunday yeah yeah typically clocker breakfast the next the next week the next week that's right clock all right thanks Joe Yolanda okay a couple couple different things first uh on Tuesday so yesterday morning we had the ab ABA event it was uh what they they put it out as an update on Ashlin projects and it was Michael and Peter machic and Beth Reynolds Claudia was supposed to join us we missed you uh and I moderated it was great we got questions ahead of time so we could prepare and people that that were here were very appreciative of the discussion and it was it was well well done they they filmed it so it'll be available to watch as well uh I this morning was on a call for mepc I'm the town representative to the Mac so this is their winter council meeting via Zoom you got a 100 plus people on a zoom meeting and voting different things and a lot of the discussion was on housing and climate impact and some of the the stuff that our sustainability committee was talking about was brought into this discussion so that was good uh there's some bills either being passed or about to be passed to make permanent too drinks and outdoor dining so that'll definitely be solidified before April 1st because it runs out April 1st and then they've also done an extension again for Zoom meetings I thought they were going to make it permanent but it's going to be pushed out to 41 202 so another year of well being able to zoom and I someone commented that why don't they just make it permanent because that's what we thought they were going to be doing everyone it's appreciative it allows us it allows people to sit in and watch our meetings and not have to sit here and still participate yep tomorrow morning is the lion senior breakfast first Thursday of the month on Saturday the Garden Club is having a presentation at the library at 10: a.m.

one of our members turned her backyard from just a grassy lawn into what is being touted as an Italian resort with b and Gardens and uh so the presentation is tomorrow you do have to register I think you can do it through the L tomorrow I'm sorry it's on it's on Saturday at 10: a.m. at the library in person should be a great event and then just I'm going to plug one more time a weekend there's one more weekend of songs for grown-ups at Hopkinson Center for the Arts on Friday and Saturday night but if you're you're interested get your ticket soon we sold out last Saturday and they're expecting to sell out again that's great Friday it was not quite sold out Friday they had they had some tickets they had some tickets still available for Friday but Friday Saturday night right Friday and Saturday night at hopkington Center for the Arts wonderful all right thank you um just it was fun just a few quick updates I just wanted to note and thank Ashwin CH chavas uh who resigned from the finance committee so I think most of us know Ash Winnie or she so thank you Ash Winnie for your efforts on that um and um you know so she got a a new new job so she's in good shape I think so um uh the MBTA reduced Fair initiative which I've talked about is moving ahead I think the board's going to see it soon and it's likely to be approved um and to go to remind they're Outsourcing their elig ability and using some very basic this goes to I think the thing you brought up uh it's 200% of federal poverty level which uh so there's a lot of sources that certify that one is like um uh Mass heal Medicaid Eligibility um and the big one you're using is SNAP benefits so if you're eligible for SNAP you're eligible for this so it's something to think about and they they are they are Contracting with third parties to uh certify people's eligibility but it's kind of a hopefully a simple process so so it's something for us to think about there are sources out there where you don't have to yourself verify people's identity um uh income um and um I I did that oml training I think has everyone else done it now that I'm scheduled for the 26 very good it's actually pretty enjoyable it's like we spent an hour and a half one thing I I did take away from it um in terms of U meet controlling meetings they did say that under the open meeting law if someone's being disruptive and this um and this had to do with physical uh disruption the um you need to give people a clear warning that they're being disruptive and must stop but if they don't you can then eject them either physically using a constable or via Zoom so that's something to think about if someone is really being disruptive I give them or the chair gives them a clear War warning that in my view you're being disruptive and you need to stop they don't stop that's under open meeting law you're allowed to do that so I thought that was interesting um and I think that's all I had so I actually have one other announcement I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about this next Thursday the 14th the YMCA has their community breakfast at the Sheran it's a free event it's an opportunity to go and meet their marathon runners it's just a Feelgood they'll also going to give be giving an update on on the YMCA that's coming here to Ashland so if you're interested let me know I can forward you the invitation or it's probably on their website as well Thursday a.m.

Thursday 7: to 9:00 a.m. next week next week have we breakfast for the oh god oh we have not next meeting we need to do that let's let's put on the it's typically the Saturday before but we have to vote it so at our our first meeting in April we'll vote that good point so let's put on the agenda right oh yeah it's only the 6th of March so our next meeting I'm like I'm I'm I'm about a month ahead of myself let's put let see put on the agenda for the 20th R's breakfast very good all right like brain is way ahead all right well it's 11 o' what is that is that really almost right I'll second that all those in favor say I good night thank you all every bye Susan I can't believe TR

e Mr Shad roll call please M bassford here Mr brunak here Mr Kenova here Mr Mia here Mr Santiago here M siano here miss Suarez here vice president Danny ABS president Paris here we have a quorum thank you vice president Dany is uh sends her regrets she's ill today Mr kov commissioner kova would you like to read the mission statement sure the mission of the Clifton School District in an open and reciprocal Community Partnership is is to provide all students with a quality education to develop the skills necessary to become literate lifelong Learners who are responsible and productive citizens contributing to a Democratic Society and an everchanging world thank you the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right to the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of this act the Clifton Board of Education has caused notice of this meeting to be publicized by having the date time and place thereof posted at the city clerk's office Clifton Public Library administration building senior citizen Nutrition Center on cable TV in the local press on the district's website and mailed to presidents of parent teacher organ organizations this meeting will be tap recorded in accordance with policy 0168 um we'll open with is our student representative here this evening Mr Rose you got um start off like exude facy the on sorry okay um March 9th I'm just kidding 10th um March 9th at 10:00 a.m.

good afternoon um it is 4:00 so we will begin the um board meeting Britney could you do roll call we'll start with Linda B present uh Britney bean I am present Colette Chapman present Lind Davidson present Michael Gordon present Su K knif present Katie Cino present uh new board member Earl Terry thank you um I think we're going to skip over one 1.02 um the introduction of the new board member as he's not here today we will table that until the next board meeting um 1.03 call to the public for agendized items we have one I um agenda item um from Belinda Carol I don't need the microphone good afternoon board superintendent Anette rikman assistant superintendent Shaina and assistant superintendent Orin stakeholders and members of the asdb community a year ago I spoke in front of the board on May 11th and our expressions of concern still hold to this day I am here on behalf of P SD as a staff member to speak for those who could not be here or who are not confident to speak or because of fear of retaliation from the agency Administration or their colleagues I would like to talk about agenda item 6.20 that's Employment contract for pdsd principal Jill Foy we are asking you to resend her contract and re-evaluate your offer as employees under Jill voit's supervision we have zero confidence under her leadership for pdsd we understand that this position is very stressful that she took over and there were multiple do tasks that needed to be handled we were told please give her some Grace and we have we stood by her and we tried to support her however this year even with a strong leadership team behind her she continues to spiral and struggles to lead this campus multiple emails discussions and conversations have been had conversations were made aware to assistant superintendent Orin our top three concerns are as follows there's a lack of vision and direction of of where pdsd should be going this year at the beginning of the year everything was in limbo due to her disorganization her impulse decision making or Pro procrastinating on tasks that needed to be completed promptly this impacts all of us on multiple levels secondly no clear transparency or communication via email conversations and discussions with things that have been brought up people don't know what's going on and have been left in the Lurch when we have conversations she makes promises that can't be kept or that she can't follow through with often we have to prompt her repeatedly for answers to questions or concerns and it often ends up with being patronized we are often deferred to assistant principal Sabra Taylor or assistant principal Flint fears as our go-to persons throughout the year they are also overwhelmed with different tasks that have been delegated to them third extensive micromanagement she has no trust in her Administration support team her leadership teacher leaders and the staff who work at pdsd for many years to do their job to the best of their ability it reflects on her capabilities to work with us and her leadership she has taken on so much responsibility which could easily be delegated if she would trust her staff whether it's a school ride fundraiser shopping for PBIS St snacks or sending out parents prare announcements assistant superintendent Orin has met with many of us you are aware of our concern concerns we know you've heard us but yet we don't have an answer on how to manage this turmoil and it impacts us we need to feel confident and feel secure in order for us to do our jobs with your supports so that we can support our students and their education to wrap things up superintendent reichman has promised us more Town Halls more collaboration more discussions about the future of pdsd and asdb and there hasn't been an opportunity to do so this year before today we ask that before you offer her contract take the time to sit down with us and truly hear us thank you you moving on to 1.04 superintendent report superintendent rikman good afternoon president kif members of the board interim assistant superintendent catch off assistant superintendent Cooper and ASB Community Welcome to our March 7th board meeting I'm very happy to see you all here tonight early earlier today we had some rain I was happy to see that I hope that you enjoyed it as well today I'm going to start with a quote the quote is from a man named Archimedes a long time ago he was a Greek engineer who discovered the principle of using lovers and he said give me a place to stand and I can move the world think about that if we have a place to stand that place has to be solid it has to be strong and stable with a strong Foundation if we are standing on a firm foundation we can interact with the world and we can in fact change it that lead me leads me to the point of strong organizational culture one quality that we often Overlook is stability we have to have stability in order to have a strong organizational culture when we sense stability we are able to predict outcomes we know what could happen we have continuity we know what's coming next we have consistency we have security a sense of security stability and security come together and work in harmony but we cannot have one without the other we have to have both stability and security when we desire an organization that is focused on growth and planning for the future we have to have stability first what happens then if we have an organization that is not stable obviously we don't trust the organization we have feelings of anxiety of unrest of ambiguity confusion and we don't know what is going on that anxiety and confusion cause stress stress causes distress that distress leads to burnout and when people are burnt out what happens next we quit our jobs we look for other opportunities we look for organizations um that have lower turnover we have higher turnover we at ASB have a responsibility to try to keep our organization as stable as we can we do have some components within our organization that have a firm foundation for example we have established core values and beliefs we have a clear mission that talks about excellence in Innovation and educational support for our students who are deaf blind and deaf blind and that mission talks about excellence and Innovation with our Leadership Excellence ENT innovation in our collaborations with school districts with parents with community members and excellence and Innovation with our partners other state agencies we also have operating principles act accountability collaboration and transparency that is how we behave and interact with each other and you provide us provided us with a strategic plan that gives us a clear direction for the future all of that is included included in a stable Foundation but the other part is strong leadership you just heard public input regarding the importance of leadership listening to what the public commenter just said was very interesting because we are talking about good stable leaders what does that look like good leaders model positive behavior others can look at that behavior and copy that behavior good leaders provide clear expectations employees under those leaders know what they're supposed to do good leaders Focus both on stability and growth good leaders focus on planning for the future always thinking about tomorrow and what needs to be done to prepare for the future so we leadership and members of the board have a responsibility to help the agency maintain stability and as I said you have done a lot of that you've provided us with a Clear Vision for the future with a strategic plan and you've selected and given US policies for us to follow you've selected and hired the superintendent to lead the agency you evaluate the superintendent's performance on an annual basis that is your responsibility my responsibility as superintendent is to clearly articulate your vision to the community to make sure that our operations align with the principles that you have approved and to work with our two assistant superintendents in the selection and hiring and retention of good leaders here at ASB how do you know that the three of us have selected and hired and are retaining good leaders you read your board reports there is extensive information that details their work the different projects that the leaders and staff are doing the efforts that they're putting into preparing for the future it is all outlined for you in our reports I read our board reports as well and some of the information I learn for the first time through those reports a lot of work is going on across the agency and it would not happen without our leaders I'm not going to go through everything in detail but I do want to give you four examples of projects that we are doing to prepare for the future one is we are working on the re accreditation process with cogia which is very important for the agency the second is on both campuses um both Phoenix and Tucson campuses we are implementing PBIS which stands for positive behavior intervention and support both campuses are implementing PBIS and if you read the board report principal Voit talks about PBIS work that is being done here on the Phoenix campus the third example as you heard at the last board meeting is to do with our work with Arizona Department of Education to help us Implement our own educator preparation program because as we all know we are not going to be able to recruit qualified teachers to meet our needs we have to grow our own and fourth is the master facili plan you've been hearing about the plan for both campuses and we are preparing for the future and trying to figure out how to get the correct facilities that will meet the needs of our students okay back to you as a board I'm going to give you a fourth responsibility when the three of us look at contracts for our leaders goodbye the three of us do our evaluations of their work that's our job we are responsible for evaluating their work as Leaders at asdb the two assistant superintendents recommend to me who we should offer cont contracts for for the following year my job then is to let you as board members know who we would like to offer contracts to and whose contracts we would like to renew for our leadership team I believe that your responsibility is to support our recommendations I want to talk about two projects that we're currently working on little bit of an update we are continuing the search for a assistant superintendent as you know that role is incredibly critical to the success of the agency and to move the agency forward into the future we currently have 21 applicants for the position our collabor collaborations with anev have been successful and are ongoing we plan to close the position posted for assistant superintendent on March 18th that week we will in will schedule meetings with the interview panel we will give them an orientation to their responsibilities as members of that panel um as they interview each applicant the last week of March which is March 25th through the 29th we will schedule in interviews for all of the qualified candidates at the end of that process the interview panelists will select three finalists and they will pass those finalists on to me during the mon month of April I will work with Anie to figure out a plan and schedule a second round of interviews for those three finalists at the May 9th board meeting hopefully I will have a candidate to present to you as the board for your approval another thing that's happening is our Master facility plan is moving forward and we are nearing completion we are ready for Community input we have two open houses for the community to attend the first open house will be on Tuesday March 19th from 3: to 6:00 p.m.

please stand as we say theed I to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with libery and justice for all okay the first thing on the agenda tonight is the consent items do I hear a motion to motion motion by Earl do I have a second second by P any discussion okay all those in favor 60 okay the next item on the agenda is uh the community is if there's anyone in the uh audience that has anything they would like to speak to that's not on the agenda or is on the agenda now is the time anyone sign up no one sign up okay hearing none then we'll move on next is cpio Elementary Billy cpio Elementary is here to present to us tonight about their Club stem and high ability sure we're honored to have you thank you so we brought a crowd um super excited thank you guys so much for allowing with allowing us to come in and present um I tell people all the time that CPO is the best kept secret in in Jennings County we are doing so many exciting things um and and you're going to see a lot of those a lot of those things um where we're hopefully getting stem certified next year I don't want to run uh the presentation but uh we have a lot of great things going because we have a lot of great students and a lot of great teachers um and because of that um hopefully we will be hearing a lot about the things that coo will continue to do as years continue down the road so um I won't stand up here and talk um you guys have heard me talk plenty of times um but I will turn it over to our pH Nal team that will cover our stem certification update I'm Amber hook this is VI Davis so we're here just to kind of update you on where we are in the certification process um this is our team we have our principal myself V who is our act she's our stem contact um our special education teacher is also serving on there we've got Hannah tunget who is our lab leader and she serves on the team as well and then a four our fourth grade teacher shot me start with this okay this is just highlights of what we've done starting in 2018 so this that's when we started to lay out our goals and our plans and it feels like it was forever ago we've been working for a long time on this uh the stem lab became a part of our students weekly routine um we've gone through or we've gotten two new curriculums by 2019 and then by 2020 or 2021 that is when we started having our um protected stem collaboration time between the teachers so they get that 40 minutes um every two weeks right um that's protected and so even if they miss it we we make sure that they they get it um in two in 2022 that's when we gave stim bends to all the classes so we have enough for every student um there's a picture right there after they were all put together um and then we're we began integrating for sure stem units at least twice a quarter we also started our stem nights um Family stem nights 2023 um we have our Winter Wonderland in in the past it was just literacy but we've also in started to include stem in that um we have now brought in Project Lead the Way curriculum and probably the most exciting thing at least for me this year is that we've Incorporated Club days that are during the school day just so kids all have the opportunity to do that and um we actually took surveys the kids came up with ideas for clubs um so everybody had input on what clubs we had um we had our first official meeting with an agenda and everything with our Community Partners um just this year um and that's kind of where we're at right now right okay so yeah this is just you you can go through this this is just kind of talking about how we picked our clubs so we have all of those clubs there there's 16 we've got things from gardening to exercising dancing karaoke hour of code but the kids are super engaged and I've included some pictures um from each Club so you might be able to tell we're able to utilize Community Partners with our clubs the library is coming in 4 is coming in with them the high school I think is sending um high school students over for the Spanish so we're able to use the high school and other resources to help the kids with the club the 4 Club their projects will actually be shown in the Jenny County 4 Fair this year and upcoming events um Thursday March 28th we will host a pancake breakfast um to thank Our Community Partners um for if you'd like to come by for pancakes with kindergarten you're more than welcome to kindergarten Taps the maple tree each year and with one of our Community Partners we boil the sap down and make syrup and then we have a taste test with and pancake syrup and real syrup and if you were here last year you got to taste our Maple serup we did not bring any samples this year Well it's not made yet is it it's it's it is actually oh um Friday May the 3D we will host Star Wars a stem experience at our school in the evening and will have the library there for that program Farm Bureau will be there um Purdue Extension um Shepherd insurance we invite Our Community Partners back to help us again with that so the kids can see these people in and out of the community um May 2024 we're going to hit the submit button to show that we are ready to apply for stem certification next school year um and then we will submit our needed documentation and our goal is um stem certification so um and these are some of our Community Partners this is one of our meetings we met with Clauss of America Jennings County Public Library and Shepherd Insurance before our into the stars um night and Computing Partnerships and you know they're important we need to show our kids that they're important that these people in the community want to help them out um we had a community partner actually said that you know letting them know now the kids that hey there's these experiences getting these kids train that they're going to want these kids later on in life because you know they're from the area Our Community Partners are wonderful too I mean they're they ask us what we need and they're and they're always telling us to let them know when they when we need something so we have we're very lucky here's a few of them um Jennings County Public Library cpio is the first school in Jennings County once a month the wild bus comes and visits the K1 students and gives them a craft and a book that they can borrow um the public library does the Pokemon club with the kids all materials are provided for the students and they also give the opportunity throughout the summer for summer reading and things like that from Bureau once a month Anita be comes into our school grades K through three she does a topic on on agriculture last or yesterday was corn before it's been cotton the kids are exposed to those things knowing what's in them Shepherd insurance has helped fund some of our giveaways when families register for these nights they're in a giveaway for a drawing and it could be like a gift basket full of gift cards from the local um businesses Purdue Extension has several programs um C in cash which is a savings program for our students right now our second graders are hatching baby chicks um they approached kindergarten said can we teach the kindergarteners cake decorating so they brought um everything in for that reading May fun is through PR extension um every kindergartener in Jennings County is read to once a month and given a copy of the book that they read to take home um CL of America um has given lots of support anytime they have extra shirts they give to our students so that our students who not have a sweatshirt has a sweatshirt they've donated water bottles in the past um their CL of America contact is the guy who boils a maple syrup for us and they've offered to do field trips in the future for our staff um and cumins cumins has supported us since the beginning um we've had Josh long come into our building he's talked to our special education students about manufacturing what it is to make sure they had those special ties with that we're just very grateful and um we're excited and I know that we're saying that we are applying to get 10 certified we are [Music] going okay um just one question yes you said March 28th but you didn't tell me what time oh it's 8 to 10 I'm so sorry okay 8 to 10 a.m.

hello and welcome to Around the Clock I'm your host galanda Greaves now we are speaking with some girl scouts from Troop 62204 I would say they look familiar because we spoked with some of these Girl Scouts a couple years ago but they've all grown up a little bit uh girls if you could tell me your name just start on this side hi my name is Lena hi my name is Bianca hi my name is Vivie hi my name is Kayla well welcome back to around the club this time you are here working on a badge so you're Girl Scouts now um how long have you been Girl Scouts and anyone can answer um ever since daisies yeah since daisies so kindergarten yeah kinden you're a daisy for how many years two two okay and then you become brownies for two years for two years and then you become Girl Scouts we become Juniors Junior that's right they're called Junior Scouts go down the line what is your favorite favorite thing about scouting that has kept you going since you were a daisy um the friends that I make friends definitely like the extra time with friends and definitely like a reconnection with nature oh um what they said and also learning how to like kind of run a business a little bit oh learning how to manage everything okay I didn't join at Daisy I joined at Junior so when did you join I joined at Junior okay so you've been what two years now yeah okay um now you were talking about learning how to run a business it is Cookie season right now right um I've always loved my girl scout cookies Thin Mints I have to admit Thin Mints are my favorite thin mint are every um how are you doing with your Girl Scout cookie sales we'll start at this end um actually we haven't really sold anything because we haven't had a lot of meetings but I do have a binder and a schedule going so I will to our next meeting so we can coordinate when to St okay um like what Lena said uh we like kind of just started we haven't really had that much time but so far I have quite a few sales do you do a lot of you pre-order right you have to pre-order and then you sell them or or is it different now well it's like it's like um like you like go around your neighborhood all you can do online like I go around the neighborhood and like and like ask for like if like they want cookies and then like um and then like sometime in like February like all like the deliver always come and then we like give it to the people I I remember the pre-sale like you had your form and you fill them all out but now you can do it online yeah talk about online um so about online is that you can pre-order online but a lot of people just don't pre-order it's also really hard to um get together and sell Girl Scout cookies because we all have very busy schedules this year and things have been very accom complex so but I know like sometimes I'll walk out of Shaw and there's people selling cookies or blush here in downtown Ashland are there any of those kind of sales coming up this weekend or next weekend yes I know we're going to blush and Shaws no I think we're only going to blush I think we're also going to Shaw maybe Mar basket so is it there are there different troops that do each of the weekends um usually Shaw is for uh younger troops okay but um even though they're we're not they're we're not the youngest little anymore um we're definitely going to like blush and Market Basket and um spreading in the different areas of our town good answer so you've been you've just been Girl Scout for a couple years you've been a junior Scout um how many of you have ever done like Girl Scout camp or gone camping with your troop I have you've done Camp there is something called encampment that uh goes overnight um is anyone else um it's there's a lot of activities and there's a bunch of um different Girl Scout Troops that are from the area not just Ashland and what Forest it Tak place they go to Cedar Hill I'm pretty sure Cedar Hill one of the Girl Scout camps yeah and I haven't slept over at Girl Scout camp it's been a while but I have recently now and it's been pretty fun it was really nice um uh we kind of um made our our um cabin haunted but we don't talk about that it's not our fault a story behind that but it doesn't sound like we should get into it other than scouting and school what are some activities that you are all involved with oh gosh me and Bianca are both part of drama club the theater okay um at the so you're at the ash middle school right now yes okay um well I don't know about everyone else but I also like ski and do soccer as well as doing Girl Scouts and drama what about good look um I'm also an acting except I do it it at HCA which is Hoppington Center for the Arts um I do right now I'm doing swimming um socer and basketball wow what about you I figure skate dance and I'm going to start skiing in dance nice good well they say if you want something done you ask a busy person and it sounds like all of you are keeping yourselves busy but also getting some good things done so thank you for coming because I know part of this is you're working on one of your media badges so before I let you go we don't I don't always do this do you have any questions for me I know you probably didn't expect that but um I was in the control room and I saw a bunch of buttons I only got to press one them okay so I'm wondering what the other buttons do they control the sound they also control where the camera is and they control it going out from here to from this building how it's being broadcast out via our cable station thank you you're welcome um I have a question sure how long have you been doing this for so I've been doing this show Around the Clock we're in our 10th season and the first season there was someone else that I did it with I was we were coach co-anchors together uh but I've been doing it myself as the only anchor for about eight and a half years and I love it I love to get to interview people and bring people in and share what's going on in Ashland with our viewers and I did not train for this as when I was younger I didn't go to college for Media or I actually have a Bachelor of Fine Arts and dance oh yep well some of us here do do dance classes all of us do all of us all of us do dance class a good thing for you yeah good okay any other questions sure okay great well thank you girls for coming back to Around the Clock good luck with your cookie sales and uh if you're watching uh check out any of the straws blush and uh make sure you get your cookie sales CU once those girls get cookies are gone you got to wait another year to get them so thanks for watching this segment of Around the [Music] Clock

4 3 2 [Applause] 1 hello and welcome to Around the Clock I'm your host galanda Greaves right now we are going to be interviewing Ian androck in welcome back to Around the Clock hello so you are here this year again because you have been the winner of the pinewood derby for the second time in a row yes yes what was that like winning it for the second time like I don't know but it just fit I just didn't know I was going to win I thought I wasn't going to win how much did you win by like literally 100 of a second 100th of a second now how many how many other cars did you have to compete against 81 81 cars yes is that the same as last year or a few more than last year a few more than last year few more than last year here so how old what's the age range of the of the participants of the pinewood derby well there is the the well there is an open division which is which like anyone can participate M so if you're including the open division basically any age okay so but and those 81 cars covered all the divisions the your Division and the open division yes and you want against all of them you won against 80 other cars what do you think made it so that your car won again this year Well we adjusted the ma the center of gravity a bit M how did you did you adjust it down or up I think we just yeah op we did op a bit okay okay does your car have a name Black Thunder and K2 Black Thunder and K2 can you shoot it toward me this way let's see take take a look at it wow very nice now so you made this car ooh it feels a little different than last year what are you given to make this car what do you mean like well you don't get to decide how you you get you are given certain things aren't you to make the car out of well basically everyone does it the same way yeah basically everyone gets gets a gets a block gets a block of wood mhm four nails of axles and four wheels okay okay so you have something special on the front of your car what made you decide to add that this is a 3D printed front spoiler to make the car a bit more aerodynamic aerodynic aerodynamic wow 3D printed did you print that at home yep W my dad has a 3D printer I see cool and the wheels do you get to pick the wheels or do they give you the wheels they give you the wheels and okay I mean it is I mean it is against the rules to get custom wheels but you can get wheels of different colors but you can't get like the custom wheels what's your what's your favorite part about the pinewood derby well the races yeah yep so how many races did you have to participate in I me participating I think it was like four okay wow that's all only four and that's what the deted that you won and are they all timed yeah so each each race has four cars okay and whoever reaches the end faster wins the race I see so and it also checks the speed and the time it got down there okay cool cool so this is your second year do you think you'll try to do it again next year I'll try to make it better next year better next year well Ian I want to say congratulations on the second time winning the Pinewood Derby I know it's a really big event here in Ashland and I want to thank you for coming back to around the clock and sharing your story about your car and winning again this year you're welcome okay good luck and maybe we'll see you next year okay okay thank you Ian you're welcome and that's our interview with Ian Andrew from the Ashland pinewood derby and he is the winner the second year in AOW thanks for watching

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[Music] you're you're out of luck bro my on my LA on my excuse me me get the candy [Applause] [Music] [Applause] beware this is live TV okay just letting you know live [Music] [Applause] m [Music] [Applause] on your from the club gra some food and drinks to support the ash High School wish WI [Music] you for their work and bringing so many special programs nowers let's meet the [Applause] players in the world all [Applause] right [Music] [Applause] Natalie Jonathan [Applause] [Music] [Applause] Parker carine [Applause] Li [Applause] all right in the [Applause] Tey [Applause] I oh [Applause] [Music] my Andi [Applause] my personal favorite [Music] [Applause] ORD [Applause] chest [Applause] all and the principal of the a young friend a pretty good replacement k [Music] [Applause] if he can dunk he's got to throw him down Now's the [Applause] [Music] Time all good evening everyone welcome to a very special broadcast of ashin basketball here on waca TV we're proud to present the Ashlin pto's clocker classic featuring All-Star lineups of Ashland school district teachers and administrators on one side we have the Ashland high school and Warren Elementary School their opponents the Ashlin middle school and the Mendes Elementary School I'm Josh Abrams and joining me at Center Court for his season debut Brian s thank you Josh so so excited right now this place is standing room only this is by far the biggest crowd I've ever seen in this gym and uh they are loud proud and ready to go tonight they are and I think behind us represents the middle school and the Mendes cuz the announcements were going was crazy so looking forward to this afternoon for this evening absolutely so we're just about ready here for the opening tip looks like uh Megan Maguire is going to take this one for the uh for gray and we're [Applause] underway all right first shot of the game Point wow gray out to an early two nothing lead just a reminder of course that middle school and Mendes will be in the gray jerseys while the high school and Warren are in the blue Megan Clark who also got a big rounding Round of Applause there and the opening announcements out on the floor directing traffic oh there's a pass inside a little bit of trouble oh blocked aside rejected by vice principal Mr Morrow okay blue throwing out got a full-court press there for a moment Brian kick out for [Music] three Off the Mark and he's going to hear that one from the crowd out of bounds but it'll stay gray ball you know it was not an air ball that that hit a little bit of the [Music] backboard so Mr ml is passing in bought about another three attempt there from the corner just off the mark rebound gray thought he's going to R there he goes right back up with it too hard off the glass gray still in control getting it outside quick jumper nothing but net and you knew who scored her first basket 2008 1,000 Point score from Ashlin now Mrs Johnston Lindsay shy so two points in this game that's over a th000 points total for Ashley ooh almost a double dribble there by Blue and another think it's going to be a be some loose refereeing here tonight here's a shot by Blue just off the front iron but a rebound following the shot up and too hard off the glass gray with the rebound and off on a fast break looking for help bounce pass ahead bounce back oh the give and go is good gray out to a quick six nothing lead you got to wonder if Blue's is going to call a timeout try to get things under control you know the passing over here the bounce passing this is fundamental one1 over here I love it don't count out blue quite yet I'm so far I'm seeing a matchup defense from both sides no zones yet air ball there the glasses just came off right hand ball left hand glasses oh we got a whistle behind the play what do we got I think that's a referee timeout for the glasses yep I think I saw that earlier this year in an Ashley Norwood game if I'm not mistaken I think we have our first sub or maybe that's a timeout maybe a little bit of both oh we're definitely getting some subs here on the blue [Applause] side okay both both teams with uh with rosters that exceed the normal MIAA limits so we should see some full uh full substitutions here fresh five aside just everyone knows these are real referees Yep they're badged based in Ashlin but these are um Mr marrow with a shot off left another offensive rebound eight nothing in terms of the gray blue I'm expecting a basket any moment over here about 2 and 1/2 minutes gone by here in the first quarter gray up eight nothing Blue from the corner no good balls loose and grabed by Johnson on the fast break here she goes up ahead all alone layup is Off the Mark rebound Grace also no good blue with the rebound you know the Ashlin coaches would be proud I think we've had maybe one chest pass 90% bounce passes right oh we got some pressure that's trouble she's in trouble oh oh thought about the shot top defense here blue puts it up off the glass no good rebound [Applause] Morrow Johnson all alone for a moment puts up the shot off the glass no good rebound blue going to dribble out himself and this is how serious this game is we we're wearing baseball caps backwards I love it seeing a lot of low top sneakers out on the floor as well definitely do I love the rainbow socks blue still over for the game almost a turnover there gray comes away with it Mr marrow make sure we going have any back Hort see a bounce pass here we go back to Johnson and good fourth point of the quarter I think that's our first timeout by blue or sub time out a little bit of both a little bit of both I'm seeing Christina Clifford checking into the game for the first time tonight for blue 20% chance she scores the first blue basket of the game what's what's the fandel bed on that one what's the line on Clifford for the first basket for blue high percentage Sloppy Joe's for everyone uh another I know you love the sloppy joe you know I do and tang tang and sloppy Jo Breakfast of Champions oh wait yeah I I tried that's weedies that's weedies yeah I tried once to do a three- School sloppy joe Challenge and it just didn't work oh blue almost gets the basket still shut out here they're down 10 nothing three and a half to go in the first quarter got Coach Jeff Allen I I think one of Middle School's basketball coaches might be girls varsity basketball oh Jessica Kelly Wheels and Deals thought about the shot now she under heavy pressure there's a shot wow nothing but net aggressive shot there from 6 feet one of the M many rainbow socks I love it y low tide [Applause] shoes well nothing a little bit halfway through the first quarter oh we're pass halfway through you guys here the defense this is crazy this place is loud very energetic first basket oh oh so close PA L blue has it rebound oh to off the glass another Rebound in the lane shot block there and still has it though somehow over to Clifford oh centering pass broken up here another bounce pass yeah nice Le for Kelly off the glass good the bank is open 14 nothing gray you think the home court is gray or blue today I feel gray has a little bit of the the the home court advantage with the cheers right now that's what it feels like definitely got some fancy footwork over here wo close shots Off the Mark blue has the ball in the lane looking for an opening oh another hand Kelly with a rebound only know it's Jessica Kelly by those shorts somebody should tell her her shorts and her socks are just not talking to each other tonight nope love it she just ran right out of her shoe gray with a rebound here looking for some more offense they're already up 14- nothing a minute and a half to go in the quarter another bounce pass oh that bank is definitely open for gray tonight I don't think there's been a basket from Gray that's hit the rim it's either been a bank or nothing but n yep another Timeout on the floor time out sub ref fresh you're watching the clocker classic on waca TV your exclusive home for ashin high school sports so we just saw our first handshake belly something with two of the players clearly plan that out okay tough defense on Gray good bounce pass there shot just short of the mark gray with the rebound settle it down a little bit Oh Long pass up ahead the poers pass eluded Pete Regan still in control here working the working the perimeter oh took his eye off the ball and a turnover for gray one of the few tonight and look who has the ball Megan Clark bringing it up for blue a fan favorite over here boy did she get a loud Round of Applause in the opening lineup blue for the shot the shot there we go they're on the board no more shut out in the final minute of play here in the first quarter 16-2 great the question is who will score the first three-point basket gray or blue look at this passing over here that's six passes oh but some offensive rebounds a fake pass Mr the power another basket there you go that one was a not a squish or or a bank it caught a lot of rim and somehow fell through all right we got 5 seconds left let's see if this going to be a buzzer beater a nice shot there to beat the buzzer but it doesn't fall so at the end of one it's 18-2 in favor of gray and just a reminder again gray is the Middle School Mendes team blue the high school and Warren te team so interesting you know we got the blue this is technically their home court over here we got the high school so sure sure we'll have to see if that comes into effect over here but what's amazing is not just the kids the parents but the signs that all these kids have kind of come here to support it's yeah again it is standing only right now loving the energy here tonight it's just fantastic all these students and all these families out here supporting the teachers this is amazing it's you got your assemblies graduation I think the clocker classic mhm is probably the third highest attendance maybe the um prom when they have for the juniors drawing a blank on what they call that uh occasion where they usually get a big crowd but nothing like this 18-2 so and of course just a reminder to our live streaming audience we are monitoring comments so say hi give a shout out to a player share your insights on tonight's game or you know even let us know how you feel about Sloppy Joe's and T we know we know Brian's a big fan you know when and doubt tanging [Laughter] forever so also want to thank we got the make the wish group outside sponsoring um all the goodies we have a raffle for four tickets for a Celtic game we're not going to talk about what happened yesterday against the Cleveland Cavaliers oh I'm happy to talk about what happened last I know you are but don't worry Brian they're still going to win the championship they're the best team in the league so the funny part is we got a Philadelphia and a Chicago person over here that are both trying to get into the playoffs sure sure so I did speak with gray Coach Dave djal before the game and uh he promised like his team is ready to go and they're loose said they could get a bit physical I'm like okay you know let's let's be careful out there but uh he is perfectly comfortable going to the far depths of his bench and believe me he's got depth plenty of depth tonight he's got depth he's got height but if it gets physical we can start singing Let's Get Physical let let's not do that all right be happy to play 80s music trivia with you but no singing no singing no Fame not yet okay second quarter about to get underway gray up 18-2 but blue will be inbounding and going from right to left across your screen so we still haven't had a foul call a three-point made a lot of fun a lot of uh we got blue and gray kind of uh I like Mr Powers we got a little that's interesting choice of colors I I kind of feel like we're going back to the Sila war with the blue and the gray but I get it oh here we go big basket there for blue doubling their score they're down only 18 to four now gray on the moving transition and blue is on a 4-2 run right now believe it or not Baseline pass gets it right back gray goes back up by 16 in the opening second here of the second quarter I think the adjustment for blue in the second half is going to be how to handle the bounce passes from Gray I think the adjustment is they got to find ways to put more balls on the basket that's is true here's a quick shot by Blue off the glass and oh my the the bank is opening for blue now as well yep that's a young one of our uh Ashton high school I think economics teacher oh look at this give and go I'm not sure I am told the blue team is mostly made up of uh War teachers but I might be wrong but again it is a Warren High School team in Blue tonight starting to tighten up a little defensively not afraid to fire the rock but doesn't fall here goes gray on a fast break wide open I believe that's Tim Horton with a left left-handed layup I don't think the ball hit the ground I think that was a deep pass from half court to Mr Tim Horton okay and a basket I do love Tim Horton Donuts Brian I mean who doesn't although I did just go to rockos the other day so oh rockos is that some good eating right there did we have our first foul is this two shots are on the floor let's see um two free throws the refs are working with positioning over here yeah again I I am told that the uh amount of basketball experience on these team Is Not Great Looks like a pom pom just stying to get thrown out here to the crowd as the first foul shot goes arai it's still 226 for gray and we have a time out sub or trying to ice the [Applause] shooter an interesting strategy here I know it's almost like a technical found up with they're just going a sub shooter thing and and of course just a reminder for uh our folks watching at home either live or or on on demand later that all games live stream here on waca are available on demand on waca TV's YouTube channel just do a search for waca TV our account will be at the top of your search results yeah definitely that's second free throw oh back iron no good they're going to give her another one I think they were doing this Subs she was just going to shoot walk off and we do have a sub okay okay all right some you don't see every day we're learning making some adjustments over here right how many phones do you have on the table right now one too many and I don't know why cuz they're both off you know what's interesting is you know some high school professional stadiums college teams has one mascot Ashlin we have two tonight yeah well we got have one for one for blue one for gray right yep you're right these are both ashin teams and it's warm in here so they're going to they're going to earn their uh their keep I guess did you ever read the um the book written by former Mr Met it's called uh yes it's hot in here I haven't is that good book good book yeah written by Mr AJ Mass who has since gone on to fame on espn.com oh interesting okay basket there for blue they're starting to chip away at that deficit they're only down 22 to8 now with under 6 minutes to go in the first half they UPS six to four in the second quarter it's all about winning the quarters winning the next play oh oh bad turnover there and blue on the fast break it's a leading pass track down no out of bounds but the fans get some action today they're [Applause] excited I mean typically at the high school we usually have just the stands open behind us not behind players and coaches both stands are out yep both sets of bleachers Standing Room behind both baskets up wa The Hop and that's a three ball everybody first three pointer of the game I thought it was going to be by blue but gray once again guess she found a way to keep her glasses on 25 to8 gray passed too far for the blue there and that was glass backboard in it's kind of like a tri Trifecta the trifecta it it reminds me of uh the Michael J fox movie Team Wolf where he makes that final basket hits the rim the backboard yep not to be confused with the sequel Teen Wolf 2 definitely not starring Jason baitman definitely not that was uh oh unusual turnover by gray let's see can they score nope ooh look at the the if you're going to sit behind the basket you're taking your life in your hands so look like another turnover by oh no it's going to stay blue ball they're making some substitutions here five fresh bodies coming out on the floor try again to chip away at that deficit 258 gray 442 to go in the first half you know Josh and I were saying so some of the goals for today it's not about winning or losing right it's obviously about having fun but I think the ultimate goal is that all the players stay healthy stay healthy leave with no injuries correct but I got to tell one of the things I'm really enjoying tonight forget about the scores like every teacher out there just has the biggest smile on their face they are having a blast 100% I love it yeah and that was a lefty layup yep we got all of sudden blue is in double digits step Oh I thought it was a step back three she was looking for a second off the iron no good rebound blue long pass ahead at midcourt to Mrs Clifford Clifford give go she was now with the ball good bounce pass I know you love the bounce pass I do driving in left handed follow the shot rebound no good another rebound still loose rean with the shot over the hoop another rebound for blue there it is 2512 a almost halfway there it's funny Blue's actually doing very well on the offensive boards you know they're definitely uh stacking up those stats over there on the offensive boards oh look they were down 18-2 at the end of the first quarter they've since outscored gray 10 to7 here in the second quarter good defensive pressure by Clifford tough matchup defense by Blue here the intensity deep but with a smile in the face love it wow another shot I don't think the feet left the ground that was that was like a foul shot I was going to say a 10-ft jumper but you're right I don't think his feet left the ground so we can't really call it that Timeout on the floor to get some more substitutions and we do of course want to thank tonight's crew Jeff Hall macki KOB for helping us out tonight so all the audio and video you're seeing and hearing courtesy of them so appreciate you guys and uh again glad to have you with us here on waca TV Brian s Josh Abrams along for the ride tonight along for the ride you know I'm trying to if I can be just the quarter as good as you know uh Chase Abrams Andrew Clay uh Rob silver I think we've had a couple other guests I'll be happy but we've had a incredible run this is the final basketball game I believe that we're televising this year yep so oh that was a kick ball yep yep they're going to call that one I glad to see they're still calling kicks because I don't think they're calling 3 second violations normally they'd have a reset on the 35 second clock but we're keeping that one it's more uh we got Middle School Metro West travel rues no 35 second clock the 10ft jumper rims out rebound by Kelly you know we have our professional photographer somewhere look at that bounce pass oh up and down doesn't get called Kelly with a driving Baseline trying to get the pass off into a double team kicks backwards look at this defense by Blue that is Tenacious [Applause] D number 6.4 oh one of ashlin's great thousand point shooter six points for her tonight blue with the ball now down 2912 you know I love we got two of the five players supporting the blue headband little old school over here look at that pass chasing down the Aaron pass setting up a pick look at that on Johnston fou shot goes wild Mr Morrow with a rejection a smile they actually had a little pick and roll they missed the pass but oh an Aon pass and the mascot getting in on the action as the ball goes out of bounds you know mascot's part of the game right now on the court [Music] [Applause] absolutely I know we have one more we have the Metro West um for I think fourth through e8th grade I think we have one more ashon basically was a host for many of the games a huge fundraiser for the um men and women's uh high school programs raised an incredible amount of money they have one more game at the new Mendes uh Mr Kyra team sixth grade girls are playing there right now that was a game that was scheduled for Sunday they got rescheduled till tonight so a lot of action going on with the Ashlin High School Ashlin gyms I should say today absolutely a turnover there in front of the gray bench gray gets the ball with a minute 20 to go here in the first half gray up 2912 and Brian we should probably mention that uh High School uh High School coach High School men's coach is going to be running a basketball clinic for Ashlin kids uh over the summer couple different you I think it's going to be for uh boys and girls corre couple of different camps going on here at the gym over the summer certainly want to check your uh check your email check the ashon website for that one yep he's done that a few years it's great cuz they get a lot of the varsity JV freshman and incoming high school as participating helping out with the coaching so kind of giving back to their Community as well but great program a bit of a slow developing play for blue layup is up and in another Lefty layup by the way so make it 14 points for blue final minute of play here in the first half gray up 294 Kelly bringing the ball up here's oh they were giving him the three didn't take it Johnson from the corner Nails it nothing but net that is her eighth basket of the day okay 3114 30 seconds to go in the half blue with not not much uh not much of a rush here bringing the ball up Court they are playing for last shot it looks like apparently maybe going for a three long pass oh off the glass hard shot followup shot got blocked and here comes gray final 10 seconds almost a walk Johnson has it has a man open on the Baseline to hard off the glass 5 Seconds to go first buzzer beater quick Kelly fires the count oh oh help that one for Kelly to beat the buzzer at the half so make it gray at the half so gray had an 18-2 lead at the end of the first quarter and they're now up 3314 at the half we're going to take a quick break you're watching the clocker classic on waca TV we'll see you back here for second half action sounds great [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] I don't know I can't see him on the game but it's hard to watch that game I [Applause] [Music] [Applause] oh [Music] [Applause] where is [Applause] [Music] don't where [Music] [Applause] [Music] you that come with your [Applause] after [Applause] he [Applause] it's it's the game [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] over here's [Applause] [Music] [Applause] my hey don't touch that don't touch this guys [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] okay [Applause] minut [Applause] [Music] go [Applause] [Music] re no more no [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] more yeah we we did live we I'm sorry we did it we recorded it last night Pete clay and I were there in at the stonum arena and uh that live stream should become available um hopefully late Thursday night on March 7th again MIAA restrictions we weren't allowed to live stream but we're allowed to post uh 20 hours after the end of the game we're underway here in the second half of the clocker classic though BW down 3314 trying to grab quick two another followup shot wildly off the glass rebound gray and that is Mr Allen some fancy dribbling over there and again if you're just joining us the gray team is the uh ashin middle school and Mendes while the blue team is the ashin high school and Warren yep so 3314 in the opening seconds here the second half blue on a fast break for a moment now trying to kick it back up top that's a three ball attempt off the glass it is it is look at that oh now that's that's a very competitive three-pointer right there so blue is winning 3 nothing now to start the second half the intens is out that is Mr Allen for three Off the Mark rebound blue he's going for maybe a five ver 60 ooh little I think there was a block yeah I got blocked it'll stay blue ball while we have the timeout just want to give a quick shout out to Hank fair for tuning in tonight he's an Ashlin Alum and a sports super sports fan for Ashlin high school awes so Hank thanks for joining us thanks for watching here on waca TV thank you Hank another defensive rebound by Mr [Music] Allen good bounce pass to the top of the zone so gray and blue both have at least one three-pointer that's going to leave a mark so that is Tiffany Tessier she is a huge fan favorite Middle School teacher my daughter had everyone loves her so um I think the crowd's going to go nuts if she gets a basket over here oh quick bounce pass great catch is blue sleeping it's an easy two it look an inbound balce pass clock didn't even start for that one 3318 and the clock still hasn't stopped started I think they're looking at it right now yep oh now we got it going now blue still with the ball dribbling into the right corner long crosscore pass intercepted seemed a little unfair a little bit but they got the ball got the ball right back yep o little but we're going to get a jump ball there no whistle starting to get a little chippy out there on the court blue with the ball trying to track this down a gray's able to get it oh tried to go on out of bounds there bounce pass out nice shot clar Megan Clark for two timeout on the floor it's a 13-point game now gray up 3320 so gray getting shot out here in the opening minutes of the third quarter six nothing run over here six nothing run so I wonder if that should be 21 cuz they had a three-pointer and two baskets right or was it two three-pointers I think they've had two three-pointers oh they had two three-pointers and the LI okay okay Gray bringing the ball up now clock is running just about 6 minutes to go in the third quarter bounce pass split the defense for a moment playing a little give and go that's a two he was inside the arc it's a long two here we go blue with the rebound I I think blue had a meeting talked about some adjustments or maybe just this side of the net is just very uh very friendly for both teams that's a three ball no good rebound gray blue somehow gets it back still moving the ball around gray comes up with it here see oh they had a two-on one look at this left-handed layup is up and in that is is that Tim Horton yep yep Tim Horton looking for the Dozen at the half dozen we're going all in I can do this all night almost running attempt at a layup yeah no good there blue somehow gets the ball back crosscourt pass they're all on the Baseline to drive back in no good still loose into the crowd somehow kept alive blew with another shot in off the rim a couple times gray finally gets the rebound and Horton Off to the Races on the near side did you see that pass behind the legs no points for style here at the clocker classic though that's a oh just off the iron that's a good shot that looked good blue better watch got po aside smart defensive play missed the three stayed with the defense snuck up over there gray resets the top of the key re ball from the corner is good hits the rainbow Horton again Five Points they were shut out no longer fivepoint run over here speaking of donuts Brian what's your favorite doughnut favorite [Applause] flavor favorite D well probably strawberry frosted with rainbow sprinkles oh interesting interes assuming the cinnam bomb is not a donut if we're cluding a Cinnabon then Cinnabon is a cinnamon bun yeah so but at rockos I know so probably the strawberry frosted with rainbow that's that's my weakness I know that you hang at Dunkin Donuts I've seen you there it it's there's no Cinnabon I'm I'm trying to get into next year's Super Bowl commercial with the Affleck and the JLo and uh Tom BR guy not on the Eagles or the Bears well I did get to visit Tim Horton's back in the late fall and uh I got to tell you they make an excellent Maple frosted as you would expect from a Canadian company warm a warm okay oh [Music] delicious okay we're back underway here third quarter action just over 340 to go gray up 3820 nice little bounce pack let's see blue able to get that deep rebound a little defensive pressure from Gray there able to deal with it thinking about that three pulls it back pass off to the side get shot gets blocked under the basket for two can't quite get it to fall good defense good offensive rebounding under there gray finally comes up with [Applause] it pass off the back there off the back shoulder it's okay okay blue ends up with it try trying to get back into this one 3 minutes to go in the quarter good bounce pass all alone in the middle of the lane defensive breakdown by gray as the layup is good you know the NBA should take a lesson over here how you have a fun competitive you know exhibition kind of match up over here I got to tell you now I think we should borrow from the MTV Rock and jock basketball games and have like a 20 point shot from half court or something you know it's that's in the uh recommend ation box for next year will there be a halfcourt shot in the third or fourth quarter tell you blue is trying to go into the lane go into the key over there okay Gray comes down with the defensive rebound and goes quickly into transition it looks like my good friend Paul Bowden of waca is trying to get in on the dut conversation he says uh the donuts standing South for the bacon donut it of course I would have no personal knowledge of how that would taste oh that's a three balls good her second three maybe second or third had won the first half that was her second yeah with the glasses on she sometimes has ball in hand glasses in the other I have not been to that place in Southboro every time I've gone cuz I think they'll stay open until they until they sell out until they sell out is that the one like in that chopping center right on Route 9 yeah next to South next to um starucks my weakness back in the day are the Twinkies Twinkies yeah if they ever have a Twinkie donut I'm in trouble just just the frosting of it those are terrible it's I know I give you a Tang wait that's a deep three oh give me some tang and a Twinkie the TTS and oh my goodness Brian you're killing me yeah my wife probably wouldn't want to see me that day or my kids oh I thought Johnson was going to launch a three there passing into the Baseline all kinds of fouls and uh no call but gets the basket but had both little celebration over there okay 4320 gray with under a minute 20 to go here in the third quarter blue with the ball good bounce pass there another one yeah Drive the lane kick it back coach Norman and Coach strange would be happy with the uh fundamental back another three ball air air ball there so that one Falls a little short gra inbound under their own basket there's so many people here right now that folks are just kind of walking back and forth it's kind of hard they're almost on the court I'll give the refs a lot of credit they're dodging dodging the uh attendants over here look at that bounce pass by this is Johnston we have blue ball nope n going to be gray clock is still running clock is still running trying to make up for Lo for the time when they left it run when they had it stopped Johnson wheeling in the lane it's good that is her 10th Point sounds like a baby Skyhook that's 1,046 points in her abent career I don't think you can count clocker classic points I think she ran out of high school eligibility a while back Johnson the big rebound there 8 seconds to go they're going to get a shot off Kelly again down she doesn't realize it nope and there's the buzzer so at the end of the third quarter gray maintains their lead it's now 4522 so 12 12 to eight eight yep all right gray outscoring there in the third quarter so uh teeing up for an exciting final quarter of action here at the clocker classic getting intense I see the look at the coaches over here we have the principal and vice principal of Mendes talking some strategy over here sure or talking about what donut say like I can't tell it's hard to read lips over here well while we have the timeout Brian just want to remind you that the clocker club ashen's official booster club is Super Active in the community and their annual golf tournament will be here before we know it I don't know if you're going to be able to play this year or not but uh the tournament takes place on Thursday May 16th at Shining Rock Golf Club in Northbridge this will be my first time at Shining Rock but I'm really looking forward to I'm heard it's a great place and certainly you know please go to clocker club.org golf for more information so what date again Thursday May 16th why is that a date of some significance for you I is it anything for you is it uh I think um so for those at home right now we'll give you another few seconds what does May 16th mean to some of you mean to Josh and myself yeah I think I would focus more on the May 16th than the Thursday correct it's it's 5:16 every year every year for us so that is our birthdays uh oh you're going to give them the answer I was all said to like you put it out there and let them put it yeah we'll put it out there in the chat we could give away prizes but yes Brian Brian let you guys know cat out of the bag it is our birthday no milestones for either of us I don't think this year I don't believe so um but we typically do our annual trip to AMC to get our to get our free birthday popcorn and soda and it might be a stop for popcorn soda and maybe leaving we'll have to see usually that's how I usually play it May is usually pretty they got some of the um Marvel movies DC movies kind of coming out that first weekend in May but any good movies you've seen so far recently not not in the theater not recently I know you know Logan is very excited about uh Kung Fu Panda 4 is hitting theaters uh tomorrow so he's trying to uh trying to put some time on the calendar for us to go catch that the first three movies were awesome Jack Black I just saw ordinary Angels uh really good the uh Hillary snin the individual that plays um on Amazon Prime the big guy oh Jack Reacher Jack reer so first name's Allen I can't think of yes Alan Richardson or something Richardson that's it that's it good job all right really enjoying Reacher on uh on Amazon Prime finish season one I'm on season two okay let me know when you're done I will I think season one was better but I did enjoy season 2 nonetheless we're back underway here in the fourth quarter gray up 4522 opening seconds to the fourth quarter and again just a reminder that uh gray is the middle school and Mendes blue is the high school and Warren and I'm telling you the coaches were strategizing on a play they opened up they haven't shot the ball yet oh a cutter look at that like right out of prince and a back door cut they were they that's what they were working on for those that break between the third and fourth quarter I also want to thank Josh he was talking me into Ted last so oh excellent show took me couple years to watch it hands down one of my favorites uh Bean watch that have to be a soccer fan to enjoy that show show very entertaining all about curiosity yep not judgment yep okay another bounce pass to a cutter kicking it back outside oh thought about the three back up top now again no shot clock so plenty of time to uh pick your shot look at the moving that ball with impunity it was we we'll do a shout out for Mr Allen on that air ball he's had a couple of steals so sure take the blue transition here got the defender to leave her feet shot doesn't fall but gray comes away with it 4722 with under 620 to go in the game so you got one basket in the fourth quarter I continue hitting that man on the Baseline look at this quick quick bounce pass again Baseline kicking it back up top cutter in the lane turnover though blue comes away with it a lot of good passing not that many shots but I I see we got blues ready for a sub trying to keep their team fresh just drove right down the lane couldn't get it to fall again as you predicted Timeout on the floor as we get some timeouts it'll give us a chance Brian to do tonight's dad joke so I've been waiting all season for my uh for this joke so no pressure buddy sure you know it is a tradition that we do during uh during all the the sports events and this is a sporting event so I brought it brought it here to the clocker classic so Brian what do you call 26 letters that went for a swim 26 letters I'm thinking of uh Dory over here just keep swimming just keep swimming from uh yes you know Nemo but obviously that's not the answer I have no idea but that's one of my favorite movies so what do you call 26 letters the win for a swim Alpha weal get it Alpha weal I like it I like it a lot I know somewhere that uh Chase is cringing on that one I tell you I've waited every every Waka every game you guys have had cuz I typically here live or listening later on always want to know what the uh dad joke of the night is so a good finale waca correspondent Rob silver texting from Southboro I believe maybe from NAC letting us know that uh gray is toying with the blue he says they're taking them to school Rob silver everybody that's a three ball from the corner just off the mark gray comes away with that rebound blue had it for a moment they want Mrs T to shoot that ball Mr Powers come on there it is a lot of unselfish passing I love it hit every bit of the rim and couldn't fall Blue Tracks down this rebound what you missed people Miss earlier Mr P was kind of uh in the game high-fiving all the fans on the Baseline over here and as you know Rob silver is our modern day Jimmy the Greek so uh he's giving us updates on the uh on the line for the game of course last update from Rob had him at a live line of 27 27 gray up by 25 right now so we'll see how this plays out 449 and Counting here and blue at the shot off the front rim no good gray with the rebound and I think let's see here 20 4722 Mr Powers misses the righty layup oh draws the foul he'll go to the line to shoot two this will be our second free throw clock stops at 429 lose right into sub interesting both foul shots both both players who took fou shots an hour left over here ref's giving some instructions on placement it's like these teachers have never been to an ason varsity basketball game before continuous learning right right we're just giving them a hard time again we really do appreciate all these teachers uh you know coming in here on personal time play some basketball risking a little bit of embarrassment in front of all these students and families but again it's all for fun and uh I think everybody here tonight is uh in the right frame of mind taking this exactly the way they should with this kind of an event 100% if you just listening if you're not watching it again there are signs everywhere from students maybe some parents we have a layup that was an interesting foul shot by Mr Powers might have went behind them they count it they did count it I think um I think Mr P is expecting a second foul shot there I'm not exctly sure what happened but we do have uh full substitutions here at least by Blue I see among others uh Christine Clifford is checked in for the blue she's posing for a picture right now I love it I think Mrs Clifford probably has one of the deepest fan bases here plenty of experience in the Ashland schools that's for sure did uh either of your kids have her as a teach any of your kids excuse me I did my youngest had her mhm and when she saw the rosters that's the first name that she kind of said so always has a smile on her face yeah both my boys had her as well and uh I I know she cringed a little bit when we saw her pregame realizing that uh we both have seniors now I know I know makes us feel nice and young I got to tell you Bri the the crow start get a little bit close to the uh to the lines here I'm worried about uh rushing the floor at the end of the game having some problems with that in the NCAA and uh see how this plays out what got a time out out behind the ball out sub I know we had something with the Iowa women's game a while back there was something recently with that it was pretty yeah I mean a player all King side a player did get injured in a postgame crowd Rush du game that's right that's right so don't mean to make light of it but uh again I'm watching these kids creep closer and closer to the court we'll see how this plays out again just 337 to go with a 20-point game great up 4724 lindsy Johnson long pass toward the Baseline I think Ray definitely did some watching or coaching on cutting cutting through up wide open shot here miss Maguire there we go nice shot and Andrew Maguire is uh helping out with the clock today I see some smiles over there gray approaching the half century mark here with 312 to go in the game oh backwards pass blind pass there nicely executed by Blue looking looking looking nobody cutting here for blue the long shot from the corner no good it turned into a pass off the glass no good another rebound gray comes out with it what was cool over there with Miss Clifford she was kind of in the in the key but knew to step out before she got the 3 second call like been waiting all night it's our first travel call of the night it's against Jessica Kelly she's been living dangerously all night many of the players have and the refs are hearing this friendly kind of uh boo over there I guess that one was a little too egregious it had to be called so 2 and 1 half to go in the game gray up 4924 there's a lot of pressure on the refs they know they don't want to make any bad calls you know this is all for fun but sure off for charity all for charity all for memories pictures turn into a terrific fundraiser here tonight for the Ashen PTO and thanks to them for putting this all together really well organized really got the word out great crowd out here tonight and uh hopefully a bit of a fundraiser as well for the make Wish Foundation as well [Applause] agree we have another sub coming in over here trying to get everybody in before the end of the game we're down to a minute 57 to go and yeah Brian again I just have to comment just what a great Community event this is here tonight seeing so many familiar faces and seeing all these kids I mean it's just phenomenal I mean literally K to 12 here tonight I was going to say like at every level and it's great to seeing some of the older kids in the high school talking to some of their teachers from you know the Middle School mindes especially the waren school so I think it tells a lot about Ashlin what we're seeing right now and experiencing absolutely this sounds a good competitive game yeah what did we start like an 18 to nothing run for uh gray yeah blue made it interesting clock stops with a minute 35 to go looks like we're going to get a turnover here blue is going to inbound under the gray basket so since then um 180 it's it's been pretty tight like um 2720 since then it looks like there are 23 point lead as long as long uh longtime a waca listeners know I am not great with the math can talk your ear off but uh you don't want me doing the math that's for sure Ray looking for an open here driving Baseline going to kick it back outside thinking about it step back three there it is Mr Allen well Off the Mark blue trying to fast break here final minute of play off the glass no good follow up nice job there by Pete Regan gray comes away with it and we've got a breakway oh Regan great hustle to get back there the defensive play of the game perhaps in the final minute hands down that's a deep two a line drive that shot finds the bottom of the basket oh my God 40 seconds to go it's a 20-point game the excitement over there by the the fans by the bench as well just checking the uh and the defense oh I'm checking the chat on YouTube and a shout out to Mrs tessia that was terrific exactly what we were hoping for 20 seconds to go now gray maybe playing Four Corners trying to get final shot we had one buzzer beater can we get a second [Music] one that was not a buzzer be but a rattled home 10 seconds let's see see he's watching the clock long three oh r no good and that'll do it we do get some kids storming the court here we go and it is a final here tonight your clocker classic for 2024 gray 51 blue 29 so gray Leed Coast to Coast tonight but blue made it interesting they fell behind early 18-2 but uh just kept narrowing the Gap narrowing the Gap and again just a really fun night you nobody's going to remember this score you know 3 hours from now but uh plenty of memories here tonight and I think what's going to happen tomorrow the stories the the collaboration with the students and the teachers and um it's it's a Memory it's a moment for for the whole community so totally agree and I think both teams had one foul maybe I think both teams had a player shooting a basket so right they both both uh both sets of foul shots took place to our left correct but I believe he was one in each half so that you know even evened up there yep refs played it pretty they let a lot go but again they played it straight you know you know it was a balanced balanced game of course it's all about fun but 51 there were some high school games that didn't reach the 50 point mark so right um so and by the way I do want to compliment the PTO brilliant idea to hold this thing on a Thursday night just as you're talking about Brian like tomorrow morning Friday morning at school there's going to be a lot of conversations a lot of Reflections a lot of shared memories from tonight's game 100% so I again it's I hope this becomes either maybe an annual or or biannual or something like that just to to witness this to be part of this experience over here again I think the next biggest crowd's probably going to be graduation graduation coming up in June you and I will be there hopefully have some cool weather but uh so this has been great um again I i' I've been listening to you Josh uh so excited about the growth of uh chase the story about Chase um it's a great opportunity I'm excited to see Logan kind of he he debuted his first game as well obviously listen to yourself and um silver Andrew Clay as well so it's such a great opportunity to hear the voices the play byplay so I was just glad to kind of be part of this experience and uh well you did a great job Brian again I certainly appreciate you joining us here tonight and uh for those of you still watching still listening um there are plenty of opportunities here at waca TV if you do have an interest in sports casting or any kind of video production please drop us Sal line you can visit us at wv.com and with that we will say good night here from the 2024 clocker classic again your final 5129 gray meaning the Middle School Mendes takes the win tonight over blue the high school and Warren so again want to say thank you to our crew Jeff Hall macki KOB want to say thanks to all of you for watching this has been Josh Abrams and Brian side here on waca TV good night and go clockers May 16th [Applause] forever

welcome to the Greenfield Public Schools policy subcommittee meeting um we'll start with a call um member Priti here member uh Den here and I'm Glenn Johnson mad and I'm here so call the meeting to order at 11:02 um your recording for broadcast on gctv if any other person's present or also recording you must notify the chairperson at this time hearing none okay don't see anyone here for public comment um I saw the minutes from October did we get the minutes from February I might have missed it I did and they were emailed um so Annie our new um school committee and admin oh there they are great is here she sent them on my behalf excellent you watch the video and create them for us wonderful and I'm looking at them and they are digestible even in a minute so I appreciate that so I would hear a motion to um approve both sets of minutes so moved is there a second second um any discussion all in favor oh I guess I should uh call the roll Calla remember genive yes remember fretti yes and I'm a yes all right superintendent if you would uh give us the overview wellness policy yes yeah what we're doing here with the wellness policy yeah so first um does it help if I share my screen I think so yeah okay um so one one thing let's go all right is that we are referring to it as the wellness program because the school committee has a policy that re requires the creation of a program to implement the policy so that's really what this represents and Amy I believe you've you've spoken to that point at meetings previously um I believe so we'll go through um I will go through there has been quite a bit of you know grammatical clean up um just can you uh change the view please Christine if you got a view and Page width or something like that um no I mean within that document there's a view uh uh see a file edit view yes what is it you'd like to see oh oh maybe I oh I'm not sure you want it big is that what you want you want it big yeah just think you're looking for magnification fit that's what you want you want to see it Glenn I to see it now I can see it give a um okay so there are some broad areas of focus for um the district to support Wellness districtwide these are some general things I'm not going to go through all of this you folks have this most of this is very much the same as what you got in the materials for the subcommittee meeting like I said there's been a little bit of cleanup around grammar and things like that um nutrition guidelines speaks to the health pieces that we follow the lunch Services um a couple of points for discussion vending machines are not are not available during the school day so if they have been they won't be um so that's you know that's part of the guidelines from uh desie and all of our health and wellness connections that um no vending machines allowed during the school day um all of this is about you know serving meals that follow the um national food service program national school lunch and breakfast programs um there are a lot of things that we will strive to do but there are some things that I think think I'm going to point out to you folks that I think might raise an eyebrow um because even though they've been in the health and wellness program I'm not sure that they've actually really been enforced which we're going to need to the first being we um you know know food as rewards basically in this program we're talking about the fact that we are not going to have food in classrooms for birthday celebrations holiday celebrations so parents um or Guardians will not be able to send in cupcakes for the class to celebrate the child's birthday or things like that they shouldn't be doing it now but this reinforces that um so that's you know I think there may be some reaction to it but as long as you know administratively we know that the committee supports the work that's identified in this program um then you know that's I think that's the important thing from an administrative standpoint um so all of this again that we'll have water available um the other thing that's going to be a little bit of a difference is that we are saying in this that we're not going to Market food items that don't comply with the snack standards and basically the national school lunch program so that means we will not be advertising the butter braid fundraiser it can go home it can happen but we're not going to put posters up in school anymore about Butter Braids because that doesn't follow the guidelines so I mean you folks have to decide if this is what you want I'm telling you what it says I'm at a disadvantage because I'm not a parent what oh Butter Braids Glen listen those are good they're um pastries Frozen pastries and you defrost them you put them in the oven and they're like fruit filed Danish but it's a thing yeah they're highly processed highly processed which is why they taste so good yes they do taste good I gotta say I I unmuted though just to quickly interrupt that in my experience with both of my kids there have not been food rewards in the classroom at in any at any level um we've never had that we don't yeah we've always known that that was the rule so I don't think that piece will be too big of a of an issue I think maybe for our our families coming into the district you know preschool kindergarten um that might be a little bit of a change but I'm I'm glad that folks who sort of start here stay here are familiar with it um okay the other thing I guess I'd like to point out is this program is really um regulation procedure it's not really policy um I guess the you folks would have to talk about um whether you vote or not but I think you know when Melissa and I spoke about it um you the committee as a whole um making a decision if you're going to support it I think is is something I would appreciate apprciate if you would consider so that um everybody knows that the school committee is in support of these steps um I think that would be but just point for discussion okay so I see Elizabeth's hand up Elizabeth do you have a question I do I was wondering um when you were talking about Butter Braids and and such and food food rewards how does that um how does that work with Valentine day because I know that's a big thing also does that also cover cover that or are they not going to be doing that anymore no food for Valentine's Day shouldn't be doing it now okay just a question because I know that's a big one too okay thank you yeah I I agree with you completely it's it's a big one um so the allergy precautions this these are things that we do you know um we are not we're talking about being nut safe in the Greenfield schools um so we will have nutree areas in each cafeteria students cannot share food um and then certainly we have if there are classrooms where there are allergies we do communicate with families about your child in this classroom can't bring not foods to school um but on the whole our district is not n safe not nut free um then celebrations and rewards um so this impact ice cream social for Honor role at the high school would be gone um they could do it after school that certainly could happen they could do it after school um we could give certificates for an allaha cart purchase through the food service department if wanted to honor our students at the high school who got honor rooll there are things that we can do but we could not do the ice cream social that is as it is currently held I mean Amy I know you were on the subcommittee so you yell if I'm saying something that's different than the discussion but um no no that's all accurate it also noted that on the um subcommittee it was never discussed in that way there was not that level of discuss discussion about that specifically I did um all the building administrators had multiple opportunities and reminders to review this so um they should have um so the um so no there will be food for curriculum related activities will still be permitted Taste of World cultures is still something that can happen if a um Elementary classroom is reading about um a different country and the teacher wants to do a food tasting from that area of the country to enhance the unit that's the type of thing that could still occur working with the school nurse um Greta to support that but outside of that no classroom cele celebrations will have food we also have an insurance issue if people bring food in from outside um people who provide food to the schools their insurance would actually be liable if something happens um it would be on the person who sent the food so I would certainly um I would not want to take on that responsibility so the other thing is there's some physical um elements that we're supporting recess every day at the elementary and middle schools um on full days we don't do recess on really release days but we're not doing them now um speaking to collaboration with the city to make sure that our recess spaces are um meeting safety standards I don't know if you folks realize but the rec department does all of the wood chips for our playgrounds they do um um the equipment on our playgrounds and DPW does the um lawn and yard maintenance so to speak for all schools except the high school we pay for a private vendor to take care of the lawn at the high school but um and then of course we want to make sure that our students who have disabilities can participate in all of our recess and physical activities um PE we do require PE up through and including High School is a graduation requirement so that is not being changed um there's no replacement for PE that that's we don't recognize um any other activity for PE requirements um and these are the standards National PE standards other activities that promote student wellness that we'll try to do things before and after school that encourage physical activity healthy eating um being Mindful and promoting not using uh Vapes or electronic cigarettes and then um strive to have joint use agreements with Community Partners we do with the rec department for example um and then the in whoops sorry then the integration of the social emotional competencies and continuing to work to um have all of our staff implement the social um social emotional learning competencies excuse me and to integrate those into curriculum when able which we are able and then to support um cultural linguistic diversity I think one of our best best um examples of that is Taste of world cultures so we continue to do that um we also um another example of this is working with our um there was a sports banquet where families actually um cooked and brought in food and um Mike ceski our athletic director worked with um chef yaffy at the high school to ensure that students from the days in who do represent um different cultures had the ability to cook um to contribute to that banquet um if they chose to and then some General Health Services this speaks to a lot of our nursing support Health um information going out I'm sure you have all seen information about our dental program and vaccine clinics so that's all something related to this staff Wellness um this is something you likely have not seen that we do send out information about um Wellness programs through the health insurance and there are other benefits such as um discounts on gym memberships things like that that all come through the insurance and Greta actually has a very nice staff lunch program it's for a cost but staff can order a variety of healthy food choices on a daily basis and I have partaken many times and they are very good and for a very reasonable price um physical that members ever come and um participate in that haven't Glenn but if you want a meal we will get you the menu I want to have lunch with you sometime you absolutely can you tell me uh listen though I'm going to tell you if it's nugget and tater hot day I'm eating a kid lunch so that I eat I will say I do eat kid lunches I said that when I got here that I would eat student food and I do and it's good so um physical environment really this is all thing I appreciate that it's reiterated but it really is required um that we have health and safety process and protocols and that we have to monitor air quality and ventilation and all of that as you know we have to be tobacco free um you've heard quite a bit Christine sorry I just Elizabeth has her hand up could we suspend our normal laws of RS of order and just have an informal conversation and Elizabeth if you want to pipe in you can okay thank you um yeah I was wondering um why if you could tell me why we do not allow um substitutions for PE such as Sports and other activities I don't know I don't know if Karen knows the history of that but what I can tell you clearly is that the health and wellness committee did not want to substitute um Karen do you know any history I can't hear Karen Christine you need to mute if Karen's gonna talk at her computer no she's talking at her at my computer I was talking so you weren't missing anything um historically probably I'd say six or seven years ago we did have this conversation at the high school in consideration of changing grad requirements however um at the time there was very few uh equitable athletic schedules that we thought would meet the PE requirements with desie so you pretty much had to be a thre sport athlete or do something all year long in order to equate to the desie guidelines and regs or you know marching band was only for you know eight events or something and the hours that you're required to have physical activity just didn't equate and we could never figure out how to make that work so that it was equitable to a PE requirement so I mean you certainly could revisit graduation requirements but currently the way they stand there is no substitution because the uh equitability of what the activity was didn't actually meet the hours from desie I understand this came up at the yelo conference this was one of the things that the the kids really wanted to talk about was having um was having the option to look at PE substitution so I want to make sure that I understand why and maybe figure out a way that we can have a follow-up conversation so that they know that we've looked into it and and understand it and so that they understand it um but um so maybe there's like a little bit of Outreach we could do there or something but um that came up so much so I wanted to find out because I know that we don't have a state law that says that we cannot do substitutions so I don't know if there's some literature that we can pass on or data we can collect um you know to pass on to the community on that yeah I mean it's just important that we're we're clear about what the administration will do and what the school committee will do so when we say we we mean the administration would would address that um if we want to change the policy or look at that that's the school committee role but in terms of the communication with the students and and everything that would be the superintendent's do domain thank you for the clarification one of the questions I was going to ask was um Elizabeth did the students actually indicate that they had talked with Derek about this question because he has not brought it to me suggesting to me they've not talked to him that's a really good question and I'm not sure about that because that's a question that I was always asking them have they gone up the chain of command properly and um made their desires known and so I don't know if they have and I think that they feel a little unsure about how to do that that always comes up too so it could be that they really wanted and don't know how to voice it or maybe they tried to and it didn't work or you know I don't really know so that's why I'm just putting it out there because that was a really strong request and I want to make sure that I can say that I've gone through this list and I understand it but I mean I don't know that they would I'll um I'll follow up with Derek um students generally know how to get in touch with one of the administrators at the high school but I will um follow up administratively about that question I mean what's nice about yellow is it kind of creates this Zone where the students feel like okay this is a place where I can talk and be heard and you know sometimes I think it's harder when you have to take the initiative yourself as a student to talk to an adult about something where the answer could be yes or it could be no and so it's difficult to initiate that conversation sometimes but hopefully they will sure but I will follow up thank you um thank you sure any other or am I good to zip through physical environment I think you're good okay so the physical environment we had talked about some of these things are required like tobacco free buildings and grounds we have our safety protocols youve you've certainly heard plenty of that um so Facilities Management Mike Buro works with principes every day about the building you know environment and building related issues um prohibit advertising on school property of foods and beverages not available for sale in the district schools again that kind of goes back to some of the fundraiser um restrictions and even a recommendation from this committee subcommittee to avoid participating in fundraisers that don't support the message that's consistent with this so that would be you know do we do the butter braid fundraiser I think pto's would have an opinion on that because my perception is they they're rather lucrative um so again the way it's written is recommend right correct intentionally yeah so not really about it's not really about saying absolutely not know how no it's just saying this is the recommended best practice right yeah and you know the question could be had is is a PTO fundraiser really the school because it is a separate entity yeah so um just a point for discussion what the school would be participating in it right what we do is give the information to students to take home to deal with outside of school yeah so I guess that's the part where we're we are participating in it by giving them information about it um we participate well yeah I mean it's a it's a thin because we send information home about a lot of things that aren't okay sponsored events but yeah I appreciate the the sort of the discussion about what that really looks like but yeah so family engagement we want families we want parents um community members to sit on the wellness committee there's a requirement that the wellness committee meet intermittently every school year and do an assessment of our wellness program every 3 years so we'll continue to um look for families to serve on that um just again communication um desires things that we will strive for um this is the accountability piece that every three years that we would review make sure we meet the requirement there is the um hyperlinks are live so that's um helpful and then policy and program updates so really the wellness committee would be making recommendations to the superintendent and the policy subcommittee about any changes that need to be considered for the wellness policy how does the um how does the food reward policy oh maybe this has nothing to do with it but what about for example the PTO wants to do teacher appreciation and are thinking of a coffee bar for teachers does that then not is that not okay is that he this Wellness is not about staff okay I just wanted to make sure okay yeah thank you um we encourage healthy behaviors from staff especially in school but I think you know the PTO sponsoring um you know coffee and maybe the PTO would think about doing fruit and whole grain muffins instead of donuts in Danish or something to that effect and you'd be super in line but this really does not affect um adults so that's it that's the end there's some resources linked at the end which I think are helpful um and that's that's it I mean I don't want to say that's it that's a lot of work and it talks it's a lot of reflection about our um practices that need to be clarified and shared and um can I stop sharing or do you want to look at anything else okay I'm gonna stop sharing it's fine with me yeah okay so um I might need a little refresher so on our February 14th meeting when we voted on the wellness policy that was before these revisions or was that a different policy no it was it was this it was the what we've since redubbed as the program you know further conversation about unless this group would like to change what's in the policy manual and replace it with this but you know this is really implementation as opposed to um I don't want to say theory that doesn't sound right um um but more of the belief system this is more the implementation so yeah so then let's see um this the school committee voted on it in February now there are some changes so is the question I guess we're hearing kind of like two questions one do we don't vote on it we basically it's not really vote to approve but vote to endorse or support the superintendent in carrying out the program and then do we need to essentially do that again because there have been some changes since the last meeting think it was last voted on um you can I I don't think the changes were substantive 95% of the changes were grammar okay you know um just making lists of things have the same tents and things like that so 95% of it was grammar there were a few things that we took out like there had been a line in there saying that that um staff had access to the wellness equipment in the schools before and after school we don't see a functional way for that to actually happen I don't know how Elementary or middle school teachers would have access to the high school fitness equipment at at random hours so we um when I say we that was um Melissa and I sat and went through and just looked at some things that had been recommended but you know weren't necessarily functional like that we took out lines that were redundant in like four places it said that we'd provide um health related information to families so we took those out in a couple places left it in one um but those I mean that's but certainly we can resend it out you could do a new first read if if that's what you folks prefer to do well again it we did it as part of the consent agenda and not as like an official first reading of a policy and I think that kind of makes sense because it's not actually a policy so it won't require the two readings and everything like that um I just want to maybe because it was in the consent agenda I don't know if we really broadcasted or support enough for it which seems to be part of what I'm hearing from you that you would like from us or is that could we just hear at this um meeting just vote to endorse it and shair that as a report of the policy meeting at the next meeting or something like that what works for you in terms of getting basically getting the backup you need from the school committee on this I think what whichever part if if having it as a report under policy and then a group endorsement makes it um stand out that would be great great okay um well then um I move that we as the policy subcommittee um endorse the health program as presented by the superintendent so moved okay I got a motion is there a second yeah second all right any discussion um I have a couple of things yeah so this is not directly related but regarding the conversation around um the uh Sports and um being able to count as PE um so you mentioned grad requirements Christine you have to refresh my memory is that a school committee thing setting graduation requirements it's a poliy I yeah I don't know that we have like do we I don't think we've done that on an annual basis like how do we've never talked about grad requirements in my experience on school committee um so that was just that's just kind of a question I don't want to do anything with it I don't like I want it sounds like there's more information from the students in a discussion with the principal that really should be the starting point but I it brought up for me oh graduation requirements like what do we do with those how often do we look at that um we have not had a reason to request the school committee vote to change them sure um but I would expect that has not been part of one of the sections yet so yeah okay that was my followup question is yes all right um and then thank you and then similarly I know the discussion that we had at the wellness committee was that um school committee could either create a wellness policy that says we endorse this program or if we already have it we would revise it to make sure it reflects that and I don't remember where we left that and I can't in a quick review even find something that we have that exists that addresses Wellness but I'm probably wrong we have a wellness policy it was and I'm not trying to quiz anyone to find it or no there's a link in this document to the school committee policy oh great okay looking um okay it it's fairly generic and basic says will oh well there was a link in this document and we can read say I didn't see it but I could I definitely could have missed it let me no there was there is a policy that speaks to Wellness um and I will look for it the title of it is School District wellness policy um remember what section it was in I never can figure out the sections they're not they don't correspond to anything that makes oh right now it's a mishmash too okay all right um I'll send it out to the three of you and I'll I'll link it back in here um it's pretty generic and generic enough that like we probably already covered in terms of should we review it and make sure it I don't believe it's in a section that's been reviewed already so the even better we'll find it we'll find it on our journey that is fine with me yeah that it says the school committee will ensure this that we Implement health and safety guidelines or something that generic okay and then I just have thank you for that and I just have one last thing and it's just a a little bit of kind of political stuff um you know and mainly towards uh chair Johnson mad I am um revisiting often still the way that um City councilors addressed the school committee budget at the last city council meeting and uh I I um applaud you uh the way you handled it um and this to me I one of the things that I haven't resolved yet in terms of the commentary from from city councilors is in regard to when when I was in school in the Greenfield Public Schools we only had a principal we didn't have assistant principles and um this whole process and the wellness program and all of the things that desie requires around this are yet another piece of why we are often feeling like there is this real tug between you know saying oh we're topheavy or you know we have too much administrative staff and also being confident as a district that we are meeting regulations and requirements and able to also leverage those things to have ask for the resources that we need for our students and I just am really the you know hearing a counselor talk that way and then seeing what we are going through regularly and what the administration goes through regularly to meet Des um is should tell you everything you need to know and then I'll stop politicking about all of it that was the last thing I wanted to say and thank you for the time thank you for your comment any other discussion before we vote on the indorsement [Music] motion uh I guess I'm just gonna app Pine a little bit it's kind of interesting I could definitely see where we're going and you know it's it makes so much sense to me to separate like celebrations from food and there's students who can't eat certain foods and you know there's ways that it reinforces unhealthy behaviors and all that at the same time these things are so deeply wor woven into a culture I think it takes a longer time than just writing up a program and just immediately you know it's it seems like our community is probably stretched enough by the no cupcakes thing before we start tackling Butter Braids you know it's like just kind of take taking the community meeting them where they are and taking it one step at a time I guess so now I want to try those Butter Braids very badly but I I'm I'm assuming they're not vegan Butter Braids I appreciate your thought GL and I think that we can um I think the wording in some of the sections regarding strive to yeah suggest recommend we we fairly intentional yeah yeah exactly that's great yeah um and I was quickly trying to find the health and wellness policy and of course I can't I know but we'll find it I could either so it makes two of it will be all easily accessible and searchable shortly yes all right are we ready to vote my friends okay remember PRI yes member denie yes and I'm a yes so our endorsement passes thank you and thanks to everybody for their hard work on this okay we'll put it on the school committee agenda for Wednesday yeah that'd be great perfect thank you okay um and um with that I think I would hear a motion to adjourn so moved is there a second second okay let's vote member forti yes member genive I keep wanting to say Omar oh I know I'm sorry I couldn't get that to change but um yes and I'm member Johnson mad and I'm a yes and we are adjourned at 11

good evening ladies and gentlemen thank you for coming this evening we um get to call to order the do Middle School showcase and yes Miss Colin in here Mr eki here Mr grippo here M herrian here Mr perini M Rosenberg here Mr White here Madam Cher thank you please [Music] stand to the flag of the United States of America and to the rep for it stands one nation under God indivisible withy and justice for all there are any public comments please do stand and speak I think we good we're good thank you all right I'm going to pass this over to misso for our yes the my we're super excited to welcome you to DOD tonight to hear from these esteemed Educators they're going to walk you through a little bit of the evolution of teaching so to speak and they're going to share with you based on some new research strategies that they are using to strengthen their current teaching practices so without further Ado I will turn it over to Miss Kelly gillo hi everyone good evening I am really excited excited to welcome you to our Middle School showcase as marleene said we are excited to share with you some of the strategies that we are working on to sort of innovate and stretch um our current teaching practices so again I'm Kelly Gilla I'm the principal I'm going to introduce you to the team here Ryan Murphy our assistant principal uh Kristen C Alana who is a literacy support teacher and also uh the division leader for the unified arts department working really closely with them on these strategies as well Andrea kof Francisco who is a current eighth grade special education teacher and also the division leader for special education and Kristen Juliano current seventh grade social studies teacher and also the division leader for the social studies Department we're happy to have them here and they're going to work with me to bring you through this journey so um and we are engaged uh as Educators really working hard to um ensure that our academic and social emotional uh Journey grows our students in in those areas at all times as much as as much as is possible um and so we have to be committed to high quality instructional practices to meet the needs of our students who they are today and they are different uh than the students that I once knew myself as a teacher here at godd many years ago or just a few years ago depending on how you want to look at it um they are different kids and they have different needs now so just as medical professionals have to continuously update their processes and practices and they have to adapt to the new discoveries and new needs of patients and new technologies that are developed we also as Educators have to develop our practices and evolve so imagine a teacher is like a skilled surgeon right honing their techniques over time and studying new theories and utilizing ing um new Innovative teaching methods they're incorporating feedback all along from their patients as we do from our students and we are refining our craft based on that feedback so just as a doctor seeks to improve their patient outcomes Educators we are striving to enhance learning and growth all the time so this year we've dedicated our professional growth to exploring the strategies of building thinking classrooms so you've heard about this a little bit in other meetings I'm sure it's called building thinking classrooms in mathematics I tend to ignore the mathematics part because it's really just building thinking classrooms for us so we're dedicated to this these are research-based practices that we believe in deeply and we are seeing the results every single day um so I say I disregard mathematics here at dog we are building thinking classrooms in every classroom we are working in these ladies and Ryan and I are working very closely with leaders of all departments um including English language arts and social studies and Science and Math of course uh but also in art in robotics and Engineering to really develop and Implement these strategies because we know deeply that this is how we reach our kids how we develop their academic growth and support them social emotionally so that complex thinking is near and dear to us and that social emotional learning that they require in order to be successful academically and we believe it is these strategies that will help us get there for these kiddos um you'll also learn a little bit tonight you'll you'll experience some of this yourselves and so not only are we engaging students but by implementing these really really impactful strategies we we remove the options for kids to fake and mimic and stall in a classroom setting so we're wasting no time we're getting kids in classrooms thinking complex and working and collaborating together thinking at high levels so tonight Ryan I'll talk to you a little bit about how we will bring you through this evolution of how we as educators are continuing to just polish that stone and refine our craft yeah so what's on t for tonight first you are going to get the opportunity to observe a model one lesson and when we refer to it as model one it's a much more traditional lesson the type of lesson that we were Expos to when we were in a middle school classroom after that we are going to have the opportunity to really immerse ourselves in a model 2 experience and by model 2 again we're going back to the newly researched strategies that Kelly was just discussing that our staff has been working on throughout the entire year we're going to then have an opportunity to look at the model one lesson the model 2 lesson do an analysis of them compare and contrast the two different strategies and then we will wrap up with what matters most but before we hand it off to our colleagues just want to point out that the model one lesson that you are about to see it is not indicative of what you would see if you were to walk down the dot middle school hallways on any given day so while our teachers are front and center they are playing a role so we have Christen castalano playing the role of christen castalano from a more traditional era and we're doing this to really give you a foundation to let you be able to clearly see the evolution that our staff our district has made in the teaching practices in the learning opportunity you said are presented and offer to our students and with that said I proudly pass it off to to our staff here who the real stars of the sh so thank you welcome um I just wanted to share with you first um a video as as Ryan and Kelly both talked about a video of more traditional model one instruction and as you watch this video um we're going to ask that you have paper in front of you um and and a pen and if you'd like to either in your head or you can use the pen and paper in front of you to just jot down what you think about or what you notice about this instructional um practice that you're going to see next um particularly pay attention to student participation and what you see from the [Music] students canun Victor I would love it thank you I walk down the street sidewalk fall in a lot I am helpless isn't my but it takes me forever to find way out walk on the St Street there's a deot in the Sun and I pretend I don't see it on again can't believe I'm in the same place but it isn't my fault still takes me a long time to get walk down the same street there's de in the sidewalk I see it it he's there still falling I My Eyes Are Open I know where I am it is my fault I get out of I walk down the same street there's a deep ho in the sidewalk I walk around it I walk down and on the street thank you okay so I'm going to give you a minute to sit silently now just one quick minute to read it silent to yourselves did such a wonderful job read it out loud now I'd like you to read it to yourselves and then we're going to ask you some questions this and I are going to start a discussion with you we're going to ask you some questions about what you think about this had and take a minute what do you know what are the words of the PO describe what do you know tell me what you know I yes deep hole sidew there's a deep hole in the sidewalk what else did you know someone falls into the hole what El keeping the wall great yes on the same street every day anything else what else do we know yeah thank you okay so that is The Superficial kind of what happened in the going on as we all know in poetry there's a deeper okay our Target today again is to determine the central idea of the so let's take a minute to think about what the big idea is raise your hand anything else it's a bad outcome maybe change the way you're doing things learn from your mistakes okay now the the poet did this in a certain way right so the poet looked at this um or wrote this these words but wrote them in a certain way so what did he or she use to get that message across what kind of language what do you see in here what's one of the devices or something that he or she did to kind of drive that [Music] so repetition right so that repetition of those lines excellent does anybody know what figurative language what other device and figurative language is used in this C device was used guess who can tell me what a metaphor is any you remember that from so metaphor go ahead metaphor is basically saying something to compare it to something else saying something to compare it to something else raise your hand when you know how this poem may be a metaphor when you say something to represent something else raise your hand when you know why this P might be a metaphor okay so a comparison to all the other times that you felt okay I'm getting there any else [Music] yes anybody want to add to that M the met I don't know they walked down the street as saying that they need something bad and then they fell into a hole say like they leted in prison in the principal's office What specifically I have no idea but just the hole in the street the hole in the street being the metaphor thank you thank you does everybody see what Victor said does everybody understand what Victor said Can somebody repeat it for me somebody repeat for me what he said about that being that PO in the street being a metaphor somebody help me out with that yes [Music] is thank you so the author either ended up in prison or in the principal's office okay let's just take a moment to talk about some of your observations how many students did you notice engag and responding in the lesson sorry I just felt like those are those are two separate questions okay because you can't always tell if the students engaged just because they're speaking okay so how many students did you notice participating actively in the lesson um maybe five maybe five is that what you were going to say yeah so they were 22 students in that classroom so we are under 25% active participation rate meaning that 75% of the class was not actively participating which is a pretty powerful number um what else did you notice as you were watching that video well I I think it was in the depth of Knowledge Questions were low um mostly teacher directed um kind of traditional set up of the classroom not necessarily all rows but some rows some two students sitting together um you know it was mostly the teacher asking questions it wasn't coming from the students up so very teacher directed only one stud I me the standards were on the board the targets were there I mean there's some you know in the classroom that you could see what was going on what the teaching was at that particular Point um but like the question what's figurative language I would rather have seen figurative language answer come from the students right absolutely but I have to say I know thinking classroom so does anybody want to add anything else any other observations um was the uh the reading assignment given just then or was it part of their homework or no it was given just then so they required to process it right there and then answer those questions on the spot process on the spot they had time to read it silently it just was cut out of the video so they had had one read through or maybe two and then they had to answer your question it wasn't presented prior to class right okay okay I thought I just want to add I thought the students were very well behaved oh that's the thing were being recorded right they were they were great they were great and you'll see a little bit more of those students later on so now we're going to transition to another model of instruction and what we refer to as model two and this one is the one that we're really comfortable with and the one that we're really devoted to here at DOD um and as a part of this we want to immerse you into this process with us to show how this works in um in subjects other than math we know that you've had a little bit of exposure with math with this we want to look at how it works at the middle level and how it works in subjects other than math so you're going to find a card at your seat and if you flip that card over the that's going to correspond with one of the boards that's around the room and those are going to form some randomized groups so we're going to ask you in a minute to go to your board and there will be a poem there the same poem that you have at your seat you can take that with you as well there will be uh two prompts up at the board and there will be some group expectations so we're going to ask you as a group to move to those group to move to those boards rather and to answer those prompts with your random group um for and we'll be around to help if you need any assistance and around to talk to you about that and once you settle in we're going to put a little bit of a timer just to keep us kind of on our for minutes so thank you please do sh Car gallery walk around the boards to take a look at what others have said so just go and take a look at what other people in the room said about the same um TRS that you were looking at yourselves just take a quick look around the room from wherever you can there's no names associated [Music] thank you thank you as far as you know this is probably probably that's about right 1607 okay just take a look at uh the ideas on board seven um and they had some really nice ideas here could someone um go on the Li and summarize for me just some one of the ideas that you see here that you may either not have thought of or you thought is really cool or you think that they did a great job with anything that you could could help us to see yeah did you you called it something else we just we just wrote it the CH yeah yeah which is a whole other way to say it right same same idea different words yeah anything else that you notice here just to build on that we kind of said that it was a metaphor especially for middle school life said it was very appropriate to your age absolutely see and we thought the exact opposite or as I did I thought seventh graders were too young to call it a medical for life because B have not to know about these repetitions but they I think they would call it a metaphor for something else and I didn't catch what the student did say he said for getting in trouble like he mentioned prison or the principal's office is what he mentioned actually um how how it turned out if you didn't take other way respon for sure yeah for sure um did anybody notice anything or or have anything to say about the rep ition which is another thing that I don't know if you noticed that we came over for some people and it was a third question underneath and if you were kind of far along we asked people to do an extended question which required you to think even a little bit more a little bit of an extension about um the resolution of the final chapter of the poem and how that contributed to the central idea of the of the poem so that was just another um technique that we use in the classroom to push students along in their thinking and to get them to to dig a Little Deeper um when ready for it so that kind of builds in a little bit of SC for us okay so we're going to ask you now to return back to your original seat and take some time to just do some self-reflection on both of the models feel free to jot down some of your ideas and after a couple minutes we're going to have you do a turn and talk which we uh do often in the classroom where you simply turn to someone next to you and share out talk about your ideas so go ahead back and we'll uh take a few minutes to just reflect to reflect on the comparison between the two models that you witness and model two what you just experienced to share out what they wrote down they talk oh I'm sorry please turn and talk first so turn and talk with someone nearby just sharing out what you noticed just because of the sake of time if we could just now stop the Turning clock and let's share out as a group some of what you might have um reflected on or some of what you might have shared out when you when you talk to each other what did you say Yes um model one reward quick thinkers and those with more compx okay okay yeah so the quick wited ones they hand up right away they get uh rewarded The Confident ones absolutely great anybody else I did not know what the poem was about when I was watching the video I lost interest right away yep so yeah in that model one it's real easy to kind of like melt into the woodwork if you would to be a student who's perhaps quiet you sit you comply and you make it through the class and it's boring any other thoughts a contrast of model two there were every we we actually ended up with four people a group and everybody was contributing something into there so there wasn't a moment where we weren't talking or writing I was getting caught out for writing slowly but we were [Music] like and we had to put tape over his mouth so he wouldn't speak so so what you're alluding remember that the Norms so what you're alluding to is a big uh facet of this and that's involving the social motion development of our middle school students like Kelly mentioned it's a different kind of student today um and this interaction live is so important things like um taking turns I did notice some groups didn't take turns passing the marker and some groups did take turns sometimes it's just a matter of listening that's a skill for a middle school student that needs to be sharpened just listening to your peers some sometimes it's taking consensus just being able to say okay the consensus of the group is such therefore we're going to write that down so really one of my biggest takeaways as a social studies teacher is the social emotional piece it really has uh proven to to grow their development in that capacity in particular um so you know just the patients too and you saw like having to stand there and some of them don't have the stamina to and uh that's another thing I myself to get up off the floor come on stay engaged with your with your peers that's a really huge takeaway for me in my social studies classroom any other comments did you notice what we were kind of doing with them trying to do it was crowded in the back anyone take note of the teachers with the blue markers trying to give that feedback you were able to see where everyone right where where everyone's thoughts were and you were able to kind of direct people Al so you really get a sense of where students are so in a class of 22 that's why right I can see as kids are working but I can't see everybody and I surely can't give 22 or close to 22 feedback all at the same time so the magic of this is I can stand back and I can see and I can go up to a group of three and I can do written feedback I can give them verbal feedback when they're ready for an extension I could take them to the next level I can take them to that next lift if they're not quite there um you know I can guide them more directly it's much more conducive to get to all of the students when you have a model like this their thinking is very very visible so in contrast to model one where we talked about having 25% of kids engaged in participating during model 2 I think Kevin you said it um everybody was engaged everybody was actively participating you could see everybody's active thinking going on and especially when you talk about some of our um reluctant Learners some of the special ed kids um kids who don't have English as their first language uh somebody else me mentioned that the confident kids are the ones that are getting up and that are participating often the special ed kids are the ones who don't have that academic self-confidence and they do shrink down into their seats uh this gives them the opportunity to feel really included to be able to piggy back off of maybe their peers answer to listen and hear something that somebody in another group is saying which is okay okay we used to think of that as cheating if we heard what Marlene said and then I said to my group oh the metaphor is this that's okay we're looking for that I think in the back five and six might have H each other and perhaps jotted down no that's all that's part of learning at first when the students would hear what another group said they quickly said we have to whisper because they're taking our answers they're cheating and they would tell on the other uh group and that's it's really it's actually excellent because they're taking in information they're learning not just with their two other peers but they're getting the benefit of hearing what other uh groups said so that's part of the learning that is far from the che cheating that often the the kids will find and that's something that they appreciate they're they're directly speaking with two other kids but they're getting the benefit of potentially hearing other people's thoughts and ideas I also think in model 2 there's really no wrong answer when those kids are you know kiddos are standing and listen and answering those questions they can throw other ideas out that they wouldn't necessarily in a model one put their hand up and in front of everyone say something that kids will laugh at right seventh graders are that's that's absolutely one of the other big takeaways those uh students who tend to like I said melt into the woodwork in model two there's less of being on the spotlight there's less of putting yourself out there what if I get it wrong I'll be embarrassed in front of my peers that's wiped away in model two you're just with your peers you have a little more sense of of confidence that if you get it wrong you know what we can wipe it off the Whiteboard cuz it's not permanent so we can simply erase it and we could write something over there's no permanency to what you put down and it becomes about the learning and not about the grade and that is the huge part of this for me as a teacher it has taken that pressure away from kids who are who want to get the a it's not about the a it's like did you learn did you grow are you learning from your peers are you are you learning on your own um and that has been a game Cher for us I also just wanted to also add when you talked about um all students being able to participate and everyone having a say um I teach students who are from other countries and who speak English as a second language typically and um they are they Thrive with this type of instruction because even though they are not proficient in English they learn the language from their peers they can ask their peers questions they can listen to what's happening and still participate without feeling like they're left out so we can they can enter the instruction at any level and it's really been really been huge in one more thing I think Ann I think I heard you say this you said to somebody else you said we can't always work with our friends so that is so Middle School they always want to work with their friends but in model 2 it's randomized and that's a key piece when the the students learn that it is legit it is randomized they understand that on any given day when they're going to be utilizing the vertical whiteboards they're going to be with any other group of of students so they really do coming from four different elementary schools uh they really do get to know each other in a much better way than if they're if we're always kind of instructing in that kind of model one uh method probably from Marlene or Jeff just to be clear on the randomization part that is is that Li to D or is that this K12 initiative yeah okay just at this Showcase tonight to Showcase what DOD is doing I say you were randomized when we did the L entry showcase too no that's what iall I'm just thinking people are home and about high school you know we do a lot of that we're still we're my family's still in the elementary school and there's you know kids like I want to do it with my friends and yeah if I recall correctly got pushed out last year randomization at we we doing it depends it depends on the schools and but it is definitely broad now that we engage kids in randomized groups and that I think as Kristen was saying is part of the social emotional development for students as well uh Fosters both academic and social emotional growth yeah there was I based on my own experience there were you know kids who didn't like it because they wanted to be with their friends but I think I'm balance it is better overall random now kids are kind used to it yeah yeah okay at all levels can I just add Tim my college students do it they know that you know sometimes they get to work with their friends on a project or something but sometimes they come into the class even if it's the zoom classroom they go into breakout rooms it's totally random who they get in that break sometimes like even when you're working with like administrators they want to work with I don't know anyone like but that's life right go to work and they're going to go to jobs and they're going to have to work with people that aren't their best friends and that's exactly what I'll say to the students this is a real world you don't pick your colleagues you don't have that luxury to pick who you're going to be working with so these skills are crucial uh the final thing is that word in model one pingpong that resonated with me when I first um started started to utilize some of the strategies the model one just like a pingpong game back and forth back and forth teacher poses questions student U raises his hand or not answers and it's that back and forth kind of volley um that's really limited to like we saw like five kids only with model two you don't have that back and forth pingpong and sometimes when when Kristen was teaching you could see like we were waiting for a student to raise their hand and the te teacher as a teacher you feel like okay who's going to raise their hand how much weight time am I going to allow for before I just kind of jump in and kind of answer the question kind of myself so with model two that whole kind of torturous pingpong uh goes away so L time is wasted right time is wasted they are they are thinking the majority of the time I also think with MTO 2 there's approved movement for them I mean these are seventh and eighth graders who want their bodies are all over the place right but they have the opportunity to move within the context of classroom you know Behavior rules or whatever they need that movement for sure great goad so I think um we have these on the Smartboard projection just to make sure we want this is really this is really the heart of everything to really kind of analyze the differences between model one and model two so we have a uh some of most of what we said also here on this slide just to make sure all the points are are made now we care so much about this we just wanted to make sure we didn't miss anything right so you're really capturing all that building thinking classrooms um and these again these scientifically research based strategies that we are committed to at Dot and K12 like Marlene said as a district we have embraced this because we can see the results we see our students thinking complexly relating to one another in a way that is richer and more meaningful really giving them those experiences and the practice really to engage with one another um they need that just like with any uh any task in life that we want to get better at we have to spend time doing it right we have to spend time practicing it and student discourse is is one of those things um answering really difficult questions is one of those things working together so yep um to wrap things up a a little bit we we believe in this so so very much we are seeing some of the benefits of not only the academic growth but that social emotional growth and we again as Educators who are committed to our craft much like again the doctors of the world the medical professionals of the world we have to continue to practice ourselves and learn and explore and look at what what's happening evaluating what's happening and continue to grow um we're never going to stop we are committed especially in ches we have great Visionaries and we have great leadership and a wonderful administrative team and amazing amazing teachers to continue this process and we're really we're really excited about it and we're happy we had the chance to share this with you tonight if we didn't convince you ourselves we'd like for you to hear a little bit from our kiddos to talk a little bit about what they think when we're just like at of seas I feel like most of the time especially I zone out more like then I'll probably like be zoning out more and not paying attention cuz I'm not really like doing anything we just listening like I feel like I need to like do something but then when we're at the whiteboards like even if you're not writing then you're still like you have to contribute and like you're standing up so like it's not like you can be slouching down like lying on your desk and like you have to be actually like contributing so that you're you can get the work done so so so um the other day you did a lesson with your teachers and you were sort of in a whole group reading this reading this poem um and um your teachers noticed that not every student was participating were you one of the kids who was participating um during that uh share out about the poem uh not really like I was really why is that uh I I just want to like to raise my hand ever like if I really know the answer a will but like if I'm not like the most sure I won't with topics I strongly have a good relationship with or topics that I know a lot about yeah yeah I do contribute with that yeah there are certain topics which I like to um stay away from or just don't feel comfortable about cuz I don't know much about it but uh yeah and like with like talking to a teacher like that can be like sometimes really intimidating for people cuz they're older than you they're they know the right answer so like a lot of kids fear that they're going to get it wrong so like if they help on their social skills then like they can be like okay it's okay if I get this wrong she's going to teach me why I got this wrong and what the right answer is I like to share my answers like with a group instead of like in front of the whole class I just feel a lot more comfortable uh I feel like people are more interactive with each other when they're in small gr so like you get to like know a lot of people in your classes and then I feel like the first couple weeks of school were hard cuz like I only really knew Norton kids and like all the other kids I didn't really know and like I didn't know their names or anything so like but now that we all know each other it's like really easy to like joke around with each other like get our work done and like talk with each other so you all know each other as you've gone through this year do you feel like you have um changed at all in how you are working in those small groups yeah like at stud here I don't really talk that much but now I talk a lot more with my group members I participate a lot uh most of the time I do hear a lot more small groups talking to each other than when you're just in a big group and then you hear like four or five main people always answering questions and then everybody else is just listening just like when we're collaborating and working on a vertical vertical whiteboard um it definitely improves on our social skills cuz like we're like the generation of the phones and like screens and social media so like we're so used to being like Oh we can just text them or call them like we don't really have like the like where like we don't really have like we need to go up to someone ask them we can just be like hey do you have this or something through text and like with the iCal whiteboards is helping us like figure out how to like talk to each other and not be like phone zombies I ideas from their ideas and they combine and make new ideas I don't mind I think interact I think the interactive whiteboards are great I they're definitely different from what I used to do back in grade school I just like just thought I like the vertical white a lot more M Bas right so um that is the end to our Middle School showcase I guess I'm going to toss it back to somebody well take take question oh oh yeah I'm sorry you're right we could certainly a question that look like are you doing vertical whiteboards in the elementary schools now yes okay well one of them just said it's not what we did in elementary school yeah but that's just I think it was more of a general throwback sort of com the 80s or something but the uh but we definitely have we boards available now at all grade levels yeah K 12 I I think this is great everything those three three kids just said completely resonated with me by the way um not to interrupt but we we did this um because at the end of the lesson the the teachers actually engaged in a quick conversation like how could we have made this better um and they tried to record it the recording didn't come out really all that that that um high quality we couldn't manage to show that to you um but we did want to try to capture some of what they had as their perspective about those two different teaching uh models we totally staged that you know the model one so that you can have ble two to something to compare it to we didn't plan the conversation and this started happen we started taping and then over I said okay guys well that was really kind of boring so how could we make this lesson better and that's when they started to come up well first thing I would do is take a copy of the poem and tape it next to each vertical whiteboard and i' have us answer these questions in small groups so we can talk to one another so they know um and it was impromed like like you said we got through we stopped taping and we're like okay let's can we make this lesson better what can we do and they came up with everything they did and then I messed up the tape that was my fault and she was holding a hall pass wasn't a scripted answer card they all had H passes yes yeah that's all authentic all of their responses are genuine for sure yeah so I was wondering um how the students treat each other is there a lot is there a lot of interference that has to be made by the teachers or do the students naturally encourage each other do they dismiss some students answers or ideas I think that you know it's a it's a process and we teach those skills along the way and this is a great vehicle for that because we can call out certain things that we see happening and then teach them the skills that they need or show them or model the skills that they need to communicate with each other so no it's not always perfect um but that's what we we can use as a vehicle to teach them those social skills which is I think the real time in real time like right when it's Happ when we first started to do it in social studies one of the first um the first lessons was because as you heard from Lily she didn't know all of the other kids in the class coming from noren so one of the first things was when you're in this group of three and you don't know anybody what would be the first logical thing to start with before we start writing or talking about anything so we scripted like hi my name is and what's your name and uh just literally start with uh addressing each other by name knowing who's in your class knowing their names so you do have to pause event sometimes and you have to say okay you you kind of know when they're done with something because that's when they'll begin to have the side conversations and and you'll know right out the gate that they're ready to like either bring it to consensus or uh to move on to the next thing uh but yeah you you just behavior modification there's that you have to as the teacher kind of set up um and that every time as teachers we learn how to better refine that how to better sometimes it's just in how you direct them with what you want to do the language you're using the real concise direct language really goes a long way so as you practice you get better and you reflect on gez why was that a disaster well because I I was confusing I should have said divide the board into three there's going to be three prompts so you reflect and you figure out ways to support you know um support it being as productive but yeah there's a lot of guiding about behaviors how to behave how to interact with each other absolutely um so so it's clear that a lot of learning happens using these techniques but um what is the uh individual accountability look like when the learning is over good question so I did this recently we were trying to fight a Venice position paper before the break came to a close because we had just finished the case study between delays and snow we didn't actually get to do the writing so I was really unfortunate planning wise we were coming back after the holiday having to write this position paper so we came back and the first thing I said is there they're going to need memory they're going to need refresher so we did a review the parts of the paper were prompts for the vertical whiteboard they were up in the groups they got to use their notebooks they could use their Chromebook documents and we reviewed and that was excellent that served as um you know a a means of prompting them getting them ready to to remember to recall to look at their resources to look at their notes to talk to peers the next day we began to write and the end product was that much better so the grading if you would wasn't the vertical whiteboard the vertical whiteboard serves to you know uh support the actual end product which in this case was a was a paper that they were doing so is there is there processing after like do you do you do we do what we did here where we kind of looked at all the answers and do they do they take notes themselves and then have that on their Chromebook or whatever to refer to later at lat dat or how does that work depends T depends on the task but yeah there's there is I think to answer your question yes there's still a place for individual application right we still need to know what each child knows understands and can do and so we there's still some of that traditional stuff in you know mixed in with this there's still applying individually they're handing in a paper um that was theirs but hopefully the skills they they got along the way from the some of those Rich activities help that paper to turn out even even stronger right no no I just more there seems to be processing after oh yeah like you have the activity but then you're you're processing as a class again you bring bring important part of it is to bring it to consensus and as often when you talk about Behavior that's where you really have to practice like now is this is all part of learning this last piece you need to really listen to your classmates for the processing part because that's really a big piece of it and you have to get them to understand that this is not just fun in games and you know they they they need to really understand that everything is purposeful and it's all part of the whole class learning so yeah um so thank you for all this tonight I'm gonna uh jump off of the teaching method you use for just a second Jeff you know that I asked about it routinely alternative Pathways post high school so tonight's the Dodge showcase M do we as a school system have connections with the magnet schools or any other high schools in the area I'm thinking uh you know technical schools a science schools does DOD do any sort of communication with those other high schools to inform the kids and the parents as well that there are other opportunities I mean I went to cheser high I think it's great but there are other Pathways for kids including that could lead to jobs post high school without necessarily going directly to College college could be something later on but I'm thinking like in my mind a science true there could be technical jobs you know an 18 yearold without a college degree could do it could be a great job um as well as you know the trades at will Cox or whatever it might be so I'm just wondering is there a any sort of working relationship between DOD and other high schools besides ch High um I don't know that I would call it necessarily quot a working relationship engage with them a lot in the sense that we'll we'll engage with them about the options that are available there and communicate that to our students and families that yeah indeed uh there are Myriad options that exist out there from you know sound school on the water to um technical other technical high schools in W Cox or um the boag program at Lyman Hall so yeah we share those and and we've had um solid participation in those uh over the last several years uh obviously treasure High Remains the predominant choice for folks um I thought maybe your qu line of questioning was going to be closer to the idea that you know we engage in these learning strategies here at DOD and then you move on to a different high school that maybe doesn't engage in the strategy and you know I've heard that for a lot of years in practice at middle school or high school okay you know sure we're going to allow um a student to redo to demonstrate their learning but College will never let you do that or that you know the high school won't won't use whiteboards of course we do but others may not you know and how is that preparing kids well because they use bad practice doesn't mean that we should first of all and second of all you know you engaged in this process today this was really an learning enriching learning experience we've taught for deeper understanding um then they carry that deeper understanding and these skills with them which will help them be successful in bad instruction just the way it would in good instruction so um that's where I thought maybe you were going but certainly in terms of respect with respect to um you know the the other opportunities that exist Beyond treasure I mean I'm sure Ryan and Kelly could talk more about that too but uh Beyond treasure high school there are other opportunities and we do you know educate parents and and students about those things thank you sure um I I just had one more comment um that um I thought this was a great presentation and um if we're going to be committing to it seems like we're committing to to this method that uh this particular presentation no offense to the to the Highland folks a few months back I thought this one uh um gave a a great representation of of what uh you could expect a child to see in a classroom that would encourage other parents who are curious to know what's going on that I think this is a this video that will be out there I guess on YouTube be a good one to watch to kind of get a feel for I can set it out to our families to encourage them watch good idea yeah and you guys got the beginner and this is a yeah I still never figured out the right answer to that M you're G to get more you're G to get more excitement when we do the High School showcase in m so um one thing I I would say to that question about uh you know and I think Chris and Juliano did a nice job articulating about why it's important to teach things you know we used a lot of our boun for forward money as you know to engage in professional development and one of the you know big pieces that we we brought into support our growth was a guy named Mike Anderson um who's worked diligently with folks in the elementary level and spent a lot of time here uh in the last couple of years and is also working with the high school and you know he would say really you you can't assume kids know how to work in groups and communicate like collaborate you know we would often just put kids together and then be frustrated when one kid did all the work or um that they talked about what was going on at the football game on Friday night or whatever the cas is and instead you know we're we're coaching kids more because it's necessary um and because we want them to successfully engage in in this practice about what does effective collaboration look like what is your role what what do you do and that's the norm are a visual reminder of what we're expecting of you when you go to the white board but the prec coaching that exists so that when they go to the Whiteboard and you know none of us is naive enough to think that they're not going to go to the Whiteboard and and maybe got lucky cards and their with their two best friends talking about the game you know Kristen knows that cues them and they they know you know and they they re-engage in a different way than Maybe they had in the past so you know there's a lot of intentional work that goes into priming for Success when you get to the whiteboards and I give these guys a ton of credit because it is a shift and in a lot of ways it's harder and and so when we talked about why collaborative time for our teachers is really important it's easy to stand in front of the room and talk at kids it's harder to come up with challenging activities that require a lot of complex things thinking at whiteboards and so you know you put you know a few rock stars together in the room they going to come up with you know great prompts that Force kids to think deeply um and it's different than just standing in front and let's read this piece and and memorize it and then you tell me what it was about and we're going to move on um and so it does take a little bit more clab time but the the results are incredibly powerful so um I want to you guys for taking the time to build these sort of things and this is just an aside in your free time to do that so thank you you guys coms questions so I just want to thank you I mean full disclosure I am a huge fan girl of Peter ladal so um and math being my background um I I appreciate also the teachers taking the RIS of jumping in there's 14 strategies I recognize that we can't do all 14 at once and so thank you Dr s for mentioning that there's support for teachers as we move along to these practices um and engage our students because I mean I'm going back to the poem this was a prime example of what this poem is about you try something you fail you've learned from it um so I appreciate this presentation as well too and I would love to see what the high school has to offer I mean Mary this is your future right here you know on the screen but it just shows that you know all students can access learning so thank you very much this a lot of work I realized behind and with that is there a motion to adjourn second um German all in favor we

Al righty we'll get started welcome everyone to our March 7th um open session meeting 2024 and uh we will get started with our student representative to the Board of Trustees Daniela Ruiz to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance and moment of silence please stand put your right hands over your heart ready begin IED flag of the United States of America and the stands naice students and teachers are entering a new age and envisioning a new world the traditional classroom style has evolved and the resource of artificial intelligence has been incorporated into our education it's important to note that AI is rapidly changing and growing every passing day inside the classroom the students and their teachers are learning about new applications for the first time and slowly finding practical applications if AI is here to stay and if taught correctly it can enhance sharpen and improve student learning it is our responsibility to educate ourselves and stay informed whether we use it as an asset or see it as a hindrance is up to us let's take a moment to step back and consider how artificial intelligence can be used to improve our knowledge not only in the workplace but in our personal lives thank you thank you Daniela and now the assistant Clerk of the board Jessica Guerrero will report actions taken during closed session thank you for item 4.1 no report of action taken regarding public employee performance evaluation superintendent 4.2 the Board of Trustees by a vot of 550 approve the settlement agreement in Orange County Superior Court case number 30 -2021 d123 6120 4.3 no reportable action taken regarding negotiations 4.4 the Board of Trustees unanimously voted to accept the agreement with employee HR -202 3-24 63 4.5 no report of action taken regarding Personnel 4.6 the Board of Trustees unanimously voted to approve the release of temporary certified teachers a full copy of employee numbers affected by this action is available for inspection 4.7 the Board of Trustees unanimously voted to not elect the certified employees listed on the agenda for the next school year 4.8 the Board of Trustees took former action by a vote of -0 to approve the expulsion of students 23-2 and 23-17 and that includes the closed session report out thank you uh we will move on oh before we do that I would like to introduce some guest guest that we have in our audience I saw earlier uh our former trustee Al Jabar is he still here and he is now oh there he is and he is a chief of staff for Doug Cha's office welcome and we have Lisa eek our CTA advocate Jeff Morgan Stern ASA president and Jennifer sesai our Alta president is there anyone that I inadvertently did not see here from our other associations or guests Heather Heather hu hutner sorry president of csca welcome [Applause] all right moving on to um item 6.1 2023-24 second interim budget report good evening board president Reno tro members of the board superintendent mauda cabinet members members of the public and uh the public viewing online tonight I'll be updating um the budget based on the current budget information that we have as update at this point and so as you guys all know we have been having a lot of roller coaster rides right through the whole budget at this point the state budget continues to be worsened um at this point and so back in January I did some update um how the legislative endless office forecasted already a $ 58 billion deficit already for the um 2425 budget this this point and so that's a big concern for us and just on February 20th the lao's office uh released additional information and there is an additional $15 billion doll of uh deficit going in and so this would uh increase the deficit to $73 billion do at this point that's with a a 0.76% cola that we currently um have for um going to next year however there is a possibility of a0 Cola that we are um hearing already at this point and just do remember we uh during the co the height of the covid-19 back in 20 uh 2021 we did have a 0% Cola at that time and so it was not that long ago that we did have to experience a 0% Cola so just want to remind um everyone about that um number there and as we go into the forecast for the 2425 as part of us second report wanted to bring you back to see what was presented from starting of the adopted budget year to what is being projected currently so the initial um budget that was proposed back in June of 2023 already at this point was about $419 U million and at um the first inm was $420 million and that Cola was actually increased to 3.94% Cola by second which is what the report we are bringing to board tonight the cola drops to uh 0.76% and so then the total uh lcff base Revenue goes down to $410 million and so that is about a 9.6 million difference between what was back in June to what is uh presented at this point and if we project a 0% Cola that we're looking at for next fiscal year um this will would um decrease the projections to$ 47 almost $48 million for a district and that would be a $2.2 million decrease from even the current um budget as second inra so as you can see the budget shifts a lot right there's there's increasing Cola changes in Cola and all these things um and so just even looking at the adopted budget to what the uh possibly could be a um second budget already um to see what it could be like based on the0 per Cola the difference is almost a $12 million difference in a single fiscal year and so just wanted to point that out this is what the projection could look like moving into next year so I wanted to share with some of the indicators um for our districts as you have all seen in this chart and we have been sharing this with um some a lot of our school school sites as well this is our enrollment projection if you're going back to 20112 at the height we were at almost 33,000 students um this fiscal year we are currently um we dropped to about 27,000 students and if you look back to 12 years of time we dropped overall about 5500 students but the drop is actually accelerating in the first uh six years between 20112 to 201718 we dropped about 2,000 students but in the last six years we dropped about 3500 students and the forecast for the next um four years going out we are looking at to drop over 4,300 students by the time 2728 and so we want to make sure that that you see this is the numbers we are receiving and we do use our feeder School data to get us this information from the five different feeders and we project them out for the out years and um unfortunately this phenomena continues to to drop um over on Orange County as a uh County we have dropped over $60,000 since Co even started and so it's a uh phenomenal mean 60,000 students not dollars no sorry 60,000 students in Orange County yes thank you the other um issue that we um are having is the attendance uh rate and so prior to covid our district were at about 95% and during the um Co year we were Sav that year uh so the the state gave us the prior year numbers um to help us with that and the first year we came back from covid we were still at a 95% rate which is phenomenal other districts dropped around 90% or even below that and we came back extremely strong and so do want to thank all the teachers and all the staff that work really hard to make sure that our kids come back to a very safe environment and to make sure that they did not continue to lose uh the learning so very appreciate everybody's hard work for that but something happened started last year we start to seeing the the dro in attendance rate and so it was each month as we open school it was dropping almost a percent percentage a month and so um last year our rate was actually at 91% uh and unfortunately we were hoping that you know with all the different things we're doing we're hoping the number would come back up unfortunately um based on the projections at um P1 that we finish back in December we are looking at a P2 number of our attendance rate of about 90% at this point Dr Nan that's attendance rate that's not uh enrollment rate correct no this is attendance and yes thank you for that question we get paid based on attendance and not enrollment so this is something that we want people to be aware of we only the district gets paid only when students show up to school right and so it's very important you show up to school but if you're sick I we we understand but but unfortunately we have now dropped 5 percentage points from where we were at traditionally in the past and so this is something very concerning and so we need to continue to work on that to see is there other ways I know even for independent studies we're now doing you know three days if you can do that and so just need to make sure you play in the van and let your school know if you're going to be out more than three days we can try to plan for that and it was Prior was 5 days so anything that we can recover in attendance it will help us and so if we can even you know get a percentage up and we were hoping we can do that unfortunately our Trend now is moving uh towards the lower attendance rate now just wanted to make sure we all know this is a phenomenal across the entire State as well at this point something have been during covid districts dropped already back in 20 uh 22 23 they were all already Statewide between 90 to 91% so we were actually one of districts that had better attendance rate so I want to tell everyone very proud of all the work you have done but then something happened right and kids are just not coming to school I think just different things but this this trend now has become a new normal for most of districts across the entire State and so this is something that we saw it coming but we want to make sure that and I know um a lot of staff are working hard to get the kids to come on campus and we know that and we just need to figure out there's another way to tackle this but this has now become a Statewide um problem as well so talk talk about enrollment and talk about attendance um the next slide here want to share um with everyone is the enrollment versus certificated teachers so we just even going back 2017 18 and to what currently so I share that we lost in this period uh in six years time over 3500 students and that's a lot of students so for example even Anaheim high schools now it's around 3,000 kids right a little little below that but can you imagine what losing an entire school and but if you look at our staffing uh going back to 201718 we had about 1231 uh teachers at that time and you're looking back if you're looking at what current Staffing we're about 1233 and we do know that um there were some the reasons why we had the increasing Staffing so we had the uh student law there was a contract um that we did um a that um that was agreed upon with um ASA to lower the student load so for junior high and Oxford the load went from 222 to 213 and for the high schools it went from 195 to 188 for class low so it's not a class as a class low student low that's what we called it here and so that first three years in 201819 201920 and 2021 because of the um agreement the Staffing did go up right because that's what we said we're we're going to we're going to do this um do this agreement and that what happened and also Co happened and so in um 2020 right and then we also got additional money for some of the one time Dollar that came through and so obviously we were able to put some of the pandemic dollars into Staffing and so that uh Staffing uh did go up during during those times and last year we did have to adjust because a lot of the pendam bank funding did ended um uh last year some of the eser dollars um did already concluded the sr1 and S um and um some of those dollars did conclude already at that time um and so currently we are where we're at is we are declining enrollment over 3500 students but yeah we had the same level of Staffing as what we had back in 20178 So Dr n can you explain what Esser funds are yes so these were the co dollars that the district received um after Co that happened and there were various funding is onetime dollars um and really um we that money was supposed to um get additional support right so you can buy different things or you can um hire additional Staffing to come and support so that we can navigate through this pandemic okay so what ahsd did then just to clarify we put this uh Co money the one-time money into temporary staffing knowing that that is going to go away eventually where other districts they didn't put it into people people they put it into things things like uh plexiglass Shields Etc around the campuses so yes well we um really value staff and wanted to make sure that our students um have the support so the district um at that point did hire um uh Staffing for that where a lot of districts uh did not do that okay and it moov to go back to um as um the where we're at with in terms of Staffing and if we can go back as 2017 18 as kind of like our base year and where we would be basically uh accounting for declining rulan and obviously we have been declining right I I've been here um telling the public telling the board that we need to address this problem and we do know that um you know we are tackling that right now with the school consolidation committee as well we know that we have this huge declining problem and we're facing that problem as we speak and working with the Western staff and orange viw staff to do that so but this will be the Staffing based on um if we did not have the agreement nor if we did not have the additional dollars what would the Staffing look like if you can see here um in 201819 we would have about 1217 um um teachers um but in reality we actually had um 1,76 so that's an additional 59 teachers and at the high whereas you know we had the uh pandemic funding as you can see in back in 22 23 we had um over 1344 um teachers at that time and we did make some um Staffing adjustment obviously for current year but do want to show the illustration that um we due to the various um things the two things was basically the pandemic funding as well as the agreement um with the bargaining group that we we did have lower the class sizes right at that point so what you're saying then is over the last six years since 2018 uh we have exceeded I should say we have been under the the negotiated uh maximum load correct yes correct and and at the end of this year with the unfortunate um riff notices going out and the layoffs that we're looking at we will still be under the maximum class size correct correct thank you and class class yeah class so um there's other um obligations that we do have we have these stur and Pur District contributions you can see here that continues to go up um unfortunately um it's it's very expensive to pay for the pension and um we have always come back keep going back to the state level and ask them is there any way that you can the state can try to help with this to begin with and so we'll continue to Lobby before that just to clarify the difference between stirs and purs and what that means okay thank you uh stirs is um for um a lot of folks who are in um teachers or even certificated management principles they're most likely in in um stirs uh pers are anybody who has classified for myself I'm in a person membership and so that's for mostly classified folks thank you great question and as you can see this chart here this is our health and uh welfare um benefits and how much we are we have spent um compared to what we're projecting as you can see um you know Healthcare is very expensive we went from back in 2009 2010 about $400 million and in by the time 2026 27 it's going to be almost double to about 79 million at that point so we need to continue and we have a great health benefits committee so really do thank all the folks who are on the benefits committee really helping us to U navigate this and I know that we have done a lot of um the group has done a lot of amazing work so really do want to thank all the bargaining group um who have um participated in that committee it's a lot of work and um you know we meet every month and there's a lot of different things that we talk about to try to make sure that we get the best benefits for um everybody in our entire District yeah even with what you just said the the fantastic job the the committee is doing the cost per employee had went up over $1,000 for this year this year which was not paid for by the employee it's paid for by the district correct so we do not have any District uh that we do not have any employee contribution in our district and um our our our group work really hard to make sure we can um support our staff and this is something that's very important to staff we we understand uh but the costs keep going up and so there's different things that we're trying to do and they're very very C conscious so even um when we increases they try to look at different ways to to try to help the plan so I do want to really take the time to thank the committee members it's really really hard and you know and we um and many of them if they have any problems they do tell their their reps who's on a committee and they do come back to tell us on the committee so we do hear from you guys so please know that um any concerns you guys have I mean you can always call the office um we we have staff working on health benefits but it's also good to let your our reps know so that they can tell us once they get to committee and so I think we do hear um what um the post is you know in in in the district so that's been extremely helpful and now I want to go into the second interim budget assumptions so you can see and then the multi-year projections um that we see are going to be projecting so you can see here current year our um cost of living adjustment is at 8.22 next year is currently at 0.76% so was I noted we are looking at a possibly a 0% Cola that's the number that's been falling around uh currently due to the uh Revenue shortfall at the state level uh and the out years is at 2.73% and 3.11% we do not believe those two numbers in oute hole based on the current year uh Cola at this point and so um but obviously we use the numbers that the county give us and so those are the number we're using but we need to be extremely cautious since we do do not want to over project The Rue in The out years and we are very concerned about that can you explain to the audience what LC FF c o l a means perfect so it's local control funding formula and uh Cola is the cost of living adjustment and so what the state do is the lcff is our base funding and that basis funding calculated based on the attendance rate and so we take those numbers and then um you would apply the cost of living adjustment the cola onto your base unfortunately because we're in declining enrollment and declining attendance rate those numbers are dropping and and um I can um as we can saw earlier when we show you those numbers and so our base funding overall it's dropping at this point even though it's supposed to increase uh but unfortunately it's it's decreasing because of our even though you get are getting a little adjustment to go up but since we are in Decline with our tendance rates lower as well so our base dollars are going down so for example um um next year our our um lcff is projected to be about $422 million and the year after in 2522 uh even with the um 2.73% Cola it's going down to $410 million and so the issue we're running into is our base funding is continuing to drop so that we cannot continue to sustain what we have so there's some adjustments that needs to be made okay and as you can see the I do want to point out the um you can see the pur we talk about the stirs and Pur contribution the employer contribution so Pur uh employer contribution this is very very expensive 26.68% and uh going up to Beyond 28.9% by 2627 so for every dollar that the district pays an employee then there's the district contribution of the so for example current year is 20 26 uh 26 Cents going into that and then the employee also have to do their contribution as well and so but the district the employer portion has continued to go up it wasn't even that long ago the contribution rate was at 13.02% and so this has more than doubled so this is a um very big problem for all the employers at this point across the state this is the budget subsumptions on the enrollment um and the declining enrollment and so as you can see in the out years um we're projecting a 1350 student decline for next year and then another um 1185 decline for enrollment and then 935 decline so if you look at 1350 students that's a size of a um I was a junior high school I'm even we have some um senior highs that are getting almost to that level so it's like you can imagine an entire school that student basically we lost them and so that's the best way I can um I I can describe it and so I think sometimes we cannot realize because we still have we still have a lot of students so when you walk on campus you're like I think it's feels good it feels okay still but if you look at the Hard numbers and these because we are a high school district we we get very good data from our feeders and our numbers been very on very tight all these time as well and so uh unfortunately this is a phenomenon u in our district the average home uh prices um the selling prices in anahem for example is over 900,000 at this point and in some of the other um cities within our district they're over a million dollars now and so they just very difficult for families to continue to get into the district at this point this next slide here will show you the our total um revenue for uh general fund in the unrestricted and restricted funding overall is um $ 65.8 million for current year and as you will see bulk of our money 70% is coming from the local control funding formula the lcff we do have still some onetime dollars in this budget as we have some of the other funding that are coming through so some of the extra dollars are still there at the this point the next slide here is the total expenditures as you will see here our total expenditures is about uh for second inm is at $78.4 million and I know this is a little hard to see but this is our montier projection um the law requires us to make sure we have a current year in the next two years in this District we do do a threeyear out you know current year plus the next three years so we will see where we're at and as you can see in our current year we are you can see in the red the changing fund balance that's what we call in accounting deficit spending at this point um by $72 million and in the out years we're looking at a $21 million deficit and a $38 million deficit and then increase up to a $57 million deficit so by um in current year in 22 20 uh in 23 24 our current year second interim we are we do have the six 6% uh available Reserve that's after all the uh various categories as well and we would go down to a 3% in 2526 so we were still good at that point but by 2026 27 we will be uh in the red uh with a negative almost 7% uh in the uh in the reserve that's includ that's after we take action for this year so this is yes this is after you take action and um thank you for your question so if the board um does not take action tonight this is your um if there's no Staffing reduction then this will be um our chart so then uh obviously current year there's um obviously this is still within our fiscal year so nothing has will be done but next year our fund balance will go down to 2.39% and then we will be uh in a negative um Reserve at that point uh in 2526 and AR we mandated to by state to have a a 3% Reserve yes 3% but the board does have the 3% uh Reserve uh as well so yes so what are the consequences of this so as you know um we had the our financial advisor that did come and presented to us as we are our our district is looking at refi making refi on the prior bonds to save taxpayer dollars about uh $3.6 million currently our district we have a very very favorable ACC credit rating from Moody at A2 so most districts most District in California the average um rating is actually double A3 which is lower than what we're at so we're actually in a very um prestigious category for that and if we do not take action um then there's a possibility that uh we may not be able to to do this process to save taxpayer the dollars as well and we would also be F uh filing a qualified budget to the county at this point I will not be able to file a positive budget based on um this other slide here um so second hold on okay sorry going back this way so the current budget that we're proposing uh will be the first one uh when all the actions are taken if we the board choose not to uh make action on um on the reductions then we would have to change our filing to a qualified at this point and if that was to take place since we are contemplating a bond in the future you probably mean we would not be successful in that Bond it will be tough I think it will be tough um obviously um investors would like to have a better rating and where we have been at we um um we were looking at to see if we we can get some type of upgrade as well since you know we have managed the Bor has and the the district has managed finances um you know well through through through this point and if we do show this kind of financial statement there will be um some jeopardies of course and so you the investors could lose confidence in that level we are not um sure we would have to go back to talk to our financial advisor to see if we could actually um um make that refunding at this point Nancy what happens if uh we uh file qualified in what happens after that so qualify means thank you great question means the district may or may not be able to um provide the financial um obligations right may or may not be able to do it um so we are still okay it's going to be really we would have to look at our cash flow to see where we're at so we will actually do a even a deeper analysis to to do that now depending where we're at if we are already in the red um pretty early on um if it gets worse we could make we could possibly uh file negative and at that point then the county would take over the state would actually appoint an administrator to come in and do that and that would that will be um not something I would recommend I I think we would need to come together as a group to try to come up with options at this point instead of of going that direction but we also want to make sure that the state given where the state level is at currently there's a um possibility of deferral that we all have experienced not that long ago and we need to make sure that we have enough cash as well it's not just the fund balance you need to make sure you have enough cash in the bank so I I hope people realize it's important that we make payroll people have um you know they have obligations at home that they need to to have and we understand that we take our jobs extremely seriously we monitor our cash and we want to make sure that we can especially to make payroll that's extremely important can you explain what deferral means um deferral means okay thank you uh defer means that let's say the state was supposed to give us money in July they would say now we can pay you in July maybe we'll pay you in August or the September payment may be paid in February so we either borrow against ourselves or we have to go out and to borrow from the county or somewhere else but it works the other way because as well because the state has a $73 billion deficit they have deferred dealing with that deficit that means they've kicked the can at some point that's going to come due and when it does they're going to say well you know we we've deferred it as long as we can and at that point that means severe cuts into the education budget so that's that's what what we're trying to manage and and and trying to be very FIS fiscally responsible at this critical juncture for the district and the um 2324 at the commitments as you can see is here uh we have the various commitments that we have we still have some payment for the CG um there's some bus leasing as well so tonight a recommendation is the board will take action um to adopt the second insur Report with a positive certification um then to uh Orange County Department of Education and the next update that we'll be getting will be the May Revis Governor will be releasing um his numbers and we will be taking the um updated numbers to the board uh in June and so obviously right now there's a lot of different things happening As We are continuing to get um monthly um Revenue numbers um from the state level and so we're monitoring those as well and um hopefully we're hoping that things doesn't get worse but we just don't know at this point there's many years of gaps at this point the governor didn't address a lot of the shortfalls and we really need them to start handling those otherwise deferring things in the out years when we are already spending money in current year that is not responsible for us either for them to be pushing the can down to us and we have to take a hit for it either so it's really tough when you do not know your revenue and you're already starting your expenditures for that current year and that's what we are experiencing with them and there's going to be possibility that um we have we are seeing that if the money hasn't been spent or if the money hasn't been allocated that they could possibly take those money back as well so there's just anything is possible at this point at that level um and not that long ago um there was a there there was sweeping of dollars remember this was I mean we had that phenomenon that happened we're able to sweep a lot of cator dollars and so who knows it could be you know that anything could happen at this point I've been in this industry this is um uh 20 years at this point and we have seen this kind of happen up and down but this time it came really really quick so from you know getting all this one time dollars to a 0% Cola that is really really quick and so unfortunately a lot of the cver dollars are coming to to to to an end uh pretty soon especially the bigger ones from the FED federal government so the the sra3 money um the expenditure deadline is September of 2024 so a lot of the one1 time dolls are coming to end at this point and so that concludes my presentation and I'm now happy to answer any more questions that you may have I had a couple questions can you return to slide five please five okay is this five yes thank okay um so we're looking at our enrollment Ada can you clarify how much each percent costs us when it comes to attendance so it's a little bit um you mean a percent or how much each percent uh loss of attendance so I think when we initially calculated I believe it was okay because it was it's a little different it's a three-year averaging and so I think we we estimate between was I think about between 12 does it between N9 to 12 million around that time I believe right is that the number but it's so the It's Tricky it's a threeyear averaging so you go back three years and so depending on what those numbers are and then that's the year so I think when we um went and did the analysis last time and so it's around that that dollar amount and so yes if we can increase our our attendance rate but unfortunately it's not going to be one for one right because it's also based on you know the the the way how we do the attendance is current year or prior year or the threee averaging whichever is greater and so there's a lot of different math we put into the formula to get our um get our rates and then I had a question on uh if you could return to slide seven okay I no I'm going backwards okay s seven okay yes um you mentioned Esser funds uh were the Esser funds just specifically used for certified Staffing levels or were they used for other Staffing levels we we did have both so we were able to um hire um some classified staff as well but majority of them were on teachers it also went to counselors well the counselor too so that's right thank you but last year we uh released or did not bring back uh counselors some other staff in that so yes so last year there was some classified staff as well as certific yes but the mostly there were mostly tempts I believe right all tempor yes tempor okay yeah see my question oh go ahead so last year there were I think 10 college in Curative Specialists that were reduced and then I think we had 14 counselors about 17% of the counseling force that was reduced they were temps that were hired with the covid funds right thank you thank you can we go to slide six okay and this could be for uh cabinet or Nancy um how did we um this we've been we've known that this uh declining enrollment has been happening and we understood the budget um deficits uh we didn't know it was going to come this fast with the zero Cola how did we address our declining enrollment and what ways were had had we addressed declining enrollment so a few things uh one we have been really intentional with um our F1 program as an example of trying to bring more International students to our schools uh which has helped to offset very little right now obviously the pandemic had an impact but prior to the pic we had we had I think it was about 60 to 70 students up until 19201 the pandemic hit uh we're now getting closer back to the 50 range but with the idea that we have more coming in so that'll help offset um we're also trying to do uh some things with the our teachers and our schools around ecence and the way that we look at Credit Recovery versus Grade Improvement um helping students pass in real time uh we spend about $2 million in Sumer programs in addition to about $400,000 a year on apex licensing Apex is a credit recovery online program that we use um and so if we can help um students in real time earn passing grades through Credit Recovery or grade recovery modules that right now are being established and built by teachers at CVA in addition to some other teachers that have been selected to help build the drafting of those modules uh that'll reduce the number of students who need summer programs or that credit recovery hence reducing the need for Apex licenses and hiring folks over the summer so that's another thing that's going to help reduce um some of the funding then obviously one of the other things that we're looking at is if the board should choose to pursue a bond I know about Nancy you have to correct me if I'm wrong about 100 million dollars is spent yearly I think in helping to upgrade facility needs and repairs and if a bond were to pass um obviously the bond is used to upgrade and improve facilities so that would be another way to save and help offset some of the decline um our Pathways the work that we're doing instructionally uh I think that's also helping but um the reality is I think ncy said just given what's happening in Orange County with the cost of living along with just decline in birth rates right and what we're seeing metricate up is also going to impact and then the other thing too is CVA although it's still relatively new school that is being used to attract other students outside of the district to come in because many other districts don't have an online Academy and if they do it's pretty much Apex uh so or what's ad bentum so we're trying to to uh do a more rigorous um relevant curriculum that our teachers have developed um at the CVA schools to to make sure that the students are getting a really whole child experience connected to our drivers the 5c's student voice purpose uh and the technical skills so those are some of the things that we've been doing to try to offset the decline in enrollment thank you and obviously you know the board already has taken that very um you know it was a hard decision to consolidate as well and and we're doing in a very thoughtful way and I know some people may say well it's still very fast but um from beginning when we started this process to when it could could happened um in Fall of 2025 it's going to be three years so we took an entire year to look at the data look at where and look at how I mean some of the initial data point and then now is how and what and where exactly location and all that and so we have um what do want to thank the the two principles um at those sides to um involve all the staff and uh parents in the community with that as well and so those are really tough work but if we don't even do that then will be even a tougher spot at this point so we are you know doing the all the hard work that we need to do at this point so if I understand you correctly uh basically where we're at with classified staff we're back to uh where we haven't um we don't have any extra staff on on board based upon the 27 18 year but we are still still above or still below excuse me the uh the negotiated rate with the teachers correct based on steing low yes okay thank you so all the classifi from the onetime dollars there are no longer here right thank you one last question um if we could go to slide okay 17 right here yes um so you mentioned if the board did not take action um that would put us in a deficit already in uh in the following year yes okay thank you on slide 14 um when we look at the piece of the pie and we talk about the lcff um and someone on the day has talk about um um how we address the local uh control funding formula as a district can you repeat your question on on slide 14 we look at the p and maybe Robert we could talk about the process that oh mean like the the process for the LC cap uh lcap process and how we um invite U yes definitely members and parents through the elcap process obviously we want all voices represented and making recommendations on how how to um you know use our our funding that is is given to us um through this process and and keeping in mind that this is these are recommendations based on on available funding so we take the um the recommendations look at what's available um and and we we do the best to to apply those those recommendations to what we already have based on the state priorities and our and our outc cap goals and president word president R tro um with the elcap process when theou had expired with our teacher Union and we were to lose the teachers that we had hired with the temporary funds it was because of the elcap process and the recommendations around class size that had made it very easing kind of gave the district cover to continue with the the class size reduction that we had for those out years when until the temporary fundings have have left I remember that thank you any more questions all right thank you Nancy perfect thank you so much thank you all right we're moving on to item 6.2 measure H citizens oversight committee annual report for March 2023 February 2024 perfect hello yes it's me again wanted to introduce you to you um our chairperson for our bond ofite committee Alan Walker to give you all um an update of what happened in this last year welcome Alan thank you good evening board members superintendent matsuda staff guests folks on line viewing uh let me start with this in accordance with the California Education Code the school district is required to establish a Citizens oversight committee the committee's duties include informing the public concerning the district's expenditures on the bond procedure or proceeds uh reviewing the expenditure reports produced by the district and presenting an annual report to the Board of Trustees which we're doing tonight and I I suspect you all have a copy of this in front of you right okay so I'm going to Breeze through a lot of it because I think some of it stuff we've gone over in the past um but I'm going to hit the highlights so you'll kind of understand where we're at things have moved along very well uh if you've heard hopefully you've heard um so these are the committee's activities for the months through March of 2023 and through February 2024 we actually met three different times over the year um June 15th uh 2023 July 17th 2024 and February 22nd 2024 basically the the topics that we as a committee in you know go through and include we we look over the designs and construction of the project actually on site each ones uh we look at the final cost reports we receive and review the different project budgets and go over those uh we look at the upcoming measure AG projects and preliminary budgets uh we also look at uh the expenditure reports after that's completed so getting to uh the first time or the first meeting we had on June 20 uh excuse me June 15 2023 we actually went back to catella and that was the first campus that we actually started doing any work on how many years ago was it 27 we started in 2015 yeah it's been almost 10 years so it's been amazing to see what they've accomplished um in this site um we looked at again the previous construction that that they uh had worked on um they're now in the middle of the pool renovation which is kind of an interesting thing I'll hit on that as a little bit later then on January 17th the meeting uh we actually went to Anaheim high school and looked at the um well actually I attended the ribbon cutting for the practice it's not is it a practice field it's the actual full-on Athletic Field amazing with the artificial turf I I believe some of you folks were there amazing I was really impressed actually too with the student that mced it did an amazing job I mean I remember when I was in high school I mean I was okay guy but he was impressive so that was pretty cool I I enjoyed that and um actually seeing the project come to fruition um if you think in terms of the students and when they look at these projects and the quality workmanship that's been done and it's like 21st century stuff it really and I and I've talked to some of the advisers some of the teachers that run the different programs with the students and they have noticed a significant um increase in enthusiasm and attending different um activities whether it's sporting or you know the music department things like that that it just adds a lot of Pride for the students when they see that you guys are taking pride in making sure their schools look right and are up to date so Props to you guys for going after this as well as the public because that that's where it all started was the public passing measure age so I'm very very pleased with that okay then uh the last meeting we had was February 22nd of this year and it was at um Magnolia High School and I'll be hitting some of the uh images or the pictures as we go on further as well you'll see those um we looked over the thing the projects that they had completed the pool renovation the uh shower and locker rooms for the boys and girls the music building but they're also right in the process of the putting together the new Administrative Building and also the cyber security building as well as the um art classrooms in the courtyard it's very impressive what they're doing uh also at that meeting we had um let's see we received the presentation and the re and reviewed the financial and performance audits for the year ending June 30 30th 2023 that was prepared by Edie Bailey and that's the uh District's auditing firm and the auditing uh the auditor stated that 82% of the measure H expenditures were tested which is a pretty good chunk of that and the final audit report was presented to the Board of Trustees I believe on the 18th of January so you got that that's very good okay uh continue a couple more slides um let's see let me do this okay uh based on our review uh of the financial and performance audit report of the uh June 30th 2023 uh projects uh let's see dates and the site visits we're confident that ahsd is attain is expending the bond proceeds only for the purposes set forth in measure H in the measure H Bond program uh and not for any other purposes and there's been some concerns in the past about that this is strictly for the campuses and we are satisfied with the efforts being made to uh complete all projects as planned and in costeffective Manner and we'll continue to diligently monitor those projects which we do and I enjoy going to see what the progress is and the upcoming product uh projects uh the next slide is uh just the membership and your familiar with all of them on us um now on the duties kind of get a little bit on for those folks that may not be aware of that um the specific activities that the citizens oversight committee uh includes I'll name a few of them we visit the sites we attend regular committee meetings um one per quarter and sometimes even more than that just depends on you know how the projects are going and what we want to see um we also review the quarterly expenditure reports as I'd mentioned um the construction produ uh project updates and the uh progress that they're making uh okay oh now this I think we I mentioned this before and it's it's very impressive and I hope even the folks that are viewing hear this this is very important the bond um measure H Bond was $249 million which was great um but Pat Uh Patty Neely and her staff because of their diligence in following and seeing what's happening within the state and the different funds that are possibly available they have put together an additional $118 million in Project money that that's incredible so yes props to them um and they they're continuing on they this will probably grow um last last year was like only 62 million so they've increased it considerably all right so moving on we've had three of the measure H bond series draws whatever you want to call them um for the funds for these projects and we've gone over those in the past so I'm not going to go through all of that but we are on the last um series and it's like getting down to the nitty-gritty as far as measure H money um because there's only out of the 249 million there's 7,569 524 34 so it's getting down to the nitty-gritty time in other words this this might be the well this won't be the last time you'll see me but it might be the second to the last there's still a few projects left all right uh uh let's see so moving on talked about maximizing that let's uh if we can turn to some of the actual pictures now and we'll recap what yep we can do that H okay I guess I'm capable of that okay uh so Magnolia is as far as the project of the pool renovation project it is completed and it was completed on schedule when within budget and I have any of the well I'm not going to ask you that for any of you that did go over there and take a look at it it's it's impressive it it really is um I'm my wife and I both attended Western so we were familiar with Magnolia because it's fairly close and what they've done to renovate and The Innovation things that they're doing it it's impressive it I won't say what we used to think of Magnolia because you know we were from Western so anyway moving on okay uh then we're going to hit the pictures and you can see if you haven't been to the campus as far as Anaheim and the track and field project that they did and it is completed and like I mentioned I was at the ribbon cutting it was it was very impressive uh it finished on schedule and within budget back actually was a little bit ahead of time ahead of schedule I think it might have been actually okay now to move forward those are the completed projects from this past year we're going to talk about the ones that are under construction right now and moving back to Magnolia thank you that uh kind of Space Age looking building up there in the leftand corner that is the cyber security build building and administration and we walk through that it's it's coming along very nicely and you can see some of the other pictures there that are kind of of the inside part they also are working on the let's see under construction some of the classroom projects as you can see there and the music building and then we have the art classrooms and the courtyard project and then switching to uh Western High School they're right in the throws of building their practice field there now it's within budget but the project is running about 3 months behind and that's because they had problems with the water table there and in essence uh they were looking to put the support peers for the uh shade structure 20 feet down and they hit water at 5 feet so that made them change and they had to send the revisions back to uh DSA uh with the uh the state so they could get that approved D so rather than going deep with the foundation or as deep they're going wide as well much wider considerably wider actually cuz they you know have to make sure that it's all stable so that will be done a little bit of a delay but it's looking good the the uh actual practice field is already completed and finished it's done it looks really nice I've actually stopped by there okay moving on we'll go to the catella pool renovation now back in the day when katella's pool was built there were total of four it was loera Magnolia what was the uh Cypress Cypress was it Cyprus yeah Savannah Savannah anyway different contractors built these pools and the contractor that built this pool unbeknownst to the district at that time when they went to renovate this and took the measurements they found that the pool wasn't in the specs or the uh code for the CIF competition so they had to make it a little bit bigger bottom line so that's uh it's it's within budget all the uh costs are being covered by the overall budget but um that's Crea a little bit of a delay so okay moving ahead uh the Marquee projects and the uh for the various sites and the actually the district fencing as well the mares the new mares that are being put in are going to be at Lera High School there L's also going to get a uh baseball and softball scoreboard a new one uh the Brookhurst is going to get their new Marquee Gilbert is going to get a new Marquee and Lexington is going to have their uh information and display board replaced as well and then looking at as uh probably everybody that came this evening they were outside coming in you saw the fencing and uh all the security that's being added to the district which is desperately needed we have h a lot of uh stuff going on around the district around the the area of the district in the evenings and so they're making sure that it is a more secure facility next slide we'll see the parking lot at Dale which is north of the campus they're completely redoing it it was in pretty bad shape actually and that's uh oh wait on the other ones yeah everything is is being accomplished on budget that's the cool thing and on schedule so far um the parking lot is on schedule and is in uh within budget for Dale and then uh catella is getting a culinary arts um building and it's on schedule and within budget as well you can see that they're also having um updates uh upgrades on the multi-purpose room the SL dance as well as the uh Ada uh ramp for that area and it's on schedule and within budget next is Kennedy High School the entry canopy image project and it will be completed in April it's coming along well the images uh if you get a chance you just go over there and check that out it's pretty pretty neat looking actually students are very impressed with what that has been accomplished actually and it's within budget as well this one oh it's still in fabrication and april'll see this right but by the end of April it'll be complete okay very good thank you uh orange view Junior High another my alma modder uh um it's getting a new parking lot put on the west side as well as new tennis courts are going to be built it's on budget uh and it's on schedule and within budget and then finally I think this is actually the yeah back to Western they're going to be um putting in new uh perimeter fencing uh for the front the face of the the high school which I thought was needed desperately needed but if if you've gone by Western High School and you've seen the parking lot uh fencing with the uh masonry pillars or posts and and the rot iron that's it's going to be that type of a look extended around the front of the school down orange and up Western so it's going to really make the school look very classy very excited about that all right so oh go we're getting close so based on the list of activities the uh citizens oversight committee advises the public that the Anaheim Union High School District is in compliance with education the Education Code of California and the bond proceeds have been expended on the project set forth no bond proceeds have been used for teachers or administrator salaries or other school operation expenditures it's all been on these projects um if you'd like to get further information if you'd like to see uh more of the slides and even some of the previous presentations you can go to the district's website and you can see all the minutes that we've uh had over the past almost 10 years uh the program reports the bylaws the audits that have been done the additional information um or all that additional information will be on the district website at www.sd blueprints do us and you just hit on the citizens oversight committee tab so that's basically it any questions uh I'm not sure if you would um feel comfortable talking about it I know a lot of people are confused about budget and how uh we have one budget for a general budget and then we have another budget and you know how are these different and uh why can't we use U this money on uh you know in our general budget yeah very similar to the state and why they're able to get additional funds through the state because of their different budgets Patty might be able to address that a little better than I I can do that you okay with that I can do that so I'm sorry no worries we're good we're my bad you're totally good you're totally good yeah Patty's in charge of spending the money right so yes so um with the requirement um with the bond you there is is the bond language we go past the bond and so he has to stay within those projects and obviously part of the um when you do the bond you also have to have a committee that oversees the uh expenditure after um it's been um audited as well and so the committee um you know I think our district is very proactive they do meet multiple multiple times throughout the year in order to review the expenditure we do have the external Auditors as well that review almost um I think I say 92% of the total expenditures as well to make sure it's in compliance with what the voters voted for that Bond language so bottom line the money cannot be used for personnel and California does have a problem with facilities it's called an unfunded mandate we have to periodically go to the public to basically get them to tax themselves and we've been very fortunate to have as alen said we passed the bond alen you were citizen volunteer at back then 249 million and because of the fact that we have a consistent record being on time on budget we've been able to leverage that for another 100 million thank you any questions for Mr Walker thank you so much for your service and for your presentation tonight my pleasure thank you for the I just want to thank you and your team that worked with you on this because how comprehensive it is it takes a lot of your time from your private life and things you maybe rather do and it's a wonderful public service to this community because one of the first things people do when they move to a new community is they look at the condition of the schools very true and if they're shabby so doesn't help real estate at all one of the questions that came up is what is our strategy to bring um enrollment to ahsd and this is all part of it alen and I agree with trustee Smith that you as citizen volunteer and you know you've put hundreds if not thousands of hours so you and the uh the team end deserve a round of appreciation a round of applause amazing you're welcome I appreciate that that's very kind and I'd like to add one thing you had a top gal with Patty Neely she's the best of the best I am AED by what this gal produces yeah it it's it's very impressive I see the whole the big reason that I wanted to get involved is because of things that had happened in the past with other bonds and um when I got around Patty Neely and her team and I started to see their dedication and and chasing after other areas of funding so they weren't just resting on Wow the $249 million that's a lot of money I mean it is to me anyway and to see what they have done I don't know who hired Patty Neely and her staff but props to them because I I've been truly impressed and it was interesting because when we passed this Bond and I was uh enjoying being a part of that and I did a lot of the phone banking there was one gentleman um Gary rittenhauer remember his name CU he went to Western High School and just by by chance in my calling his name popped up and he was a year older than me but he grilled me cuz he had heard about this previous history of bonds and such and I said I feel just like you do Gary and that's why I'm willing to get involved because I want to make sure this gets done correctly and it's it's met my expectations and honestly not just saying it it's gone beyond on what they've been able to accomplish and the quality of the the designs at these schools amazing and and the students like I say the key thing is they are really taking Pride more pride and getting involved and that's what makes a difference in my opinion I'll just make a quick comment my uh I removed our kids uh from public education years ago and I picked our son up the first uh day of school and I said how did it go and he said Mom the bathrooms were clean so that is when it comes to Pride and how you value what you participate in life is so key yeah and I recommend you for sainthood for what you've done thank thank you very much thank you Mr Walker appreciate [Applause] you oh thank you so much all right uh moving on to 7.1 our student representative report Daniela Ruiz Anaheim wants to highlight their amazing da teachers presenting their D process at the cab expo at the Anaheim Convention Center Cambridge Virtual Academy held CVA compliments where students can give a compliment to a teacher friend or staff about what they enjoy about them Cypress theater performed that's not how I remember it the Cypress stagecraft class helped with the set production Gilbert High School had their second blood drive in which many students participated in Saving Lives catella successfully held their third RSVP Summit in which students provided feedback and presented an action plan for the next steps forward for RSVP Kennedy wants to congratulate Kennedy's varsity cheer team for their back-to-back Champion Victory way to go Irish L's Vietnamese Student Association vssa proudly hosted the first ever tet Lunar New Year Festival in history the greatest showman Magnolia's International show by definition represents numerous amounts of international culture and Cuisine the show took place on February 16th the show featured alumni performances and cultural performance Es at Oxford girls soccer has now progressed into quarterfinals for CIF congratulations at Savannah the Lady Rebels made history during their season by creating the record for having the most wins in school's history 26 ranking number one in CIF SS for the first time ranking number two in state CIF for the first time and becoming CIF State quarterfinalists for the first time in Savannah's history at Western star wrestlers had a very competitive and impressive past week as Isaac Gonzalez a junior at Western became the 11th CIF champion in the school's history representing the girls wrestling team was Adrena Vio who will be competing the state championship in Bakersfield this upcoming week for those in for students interested we are looking to host a student Forum regarding budgeting and staff in the next two weeks date and time is to be determined that concludes the ahc school report thank you [Applause] Daniel all right uh item 7.2 this is uh the time where we have our student speakers trusty former truste out uh this was his brainchild so I'm so glad that he's here to uh witness our students in action all right first up uh we'll give them a little bit of time to come up here Maya lababa or sorry Maya laabi from Cyprus next up will be after her uh Natalia carll and I apologize ahead of time if I'm not getting the name correctly Maya then Natalia Natalia carille coming so there are a variety of topics uh amongst both the student speakers and the regular public comment uh while while President uh Randall tro is is going through the the sheets I do want to let all of our speakers know we do have a a timer uh it will be red uh when you're done yellow when it's a warning and it will be green during your time to talk we do have a three minute comment period uh there's also a a little sheet on the the podium to REM you as well so we have a number we have about [Applause] [Music] students two minutes okay please go ahead and introduce yourselves please we fill out three three separate forms okay I'll find you thank youp top uh separate topics I think so we we're one topic but we filled out three separate forms yeah oh yeah yeah yeah okay okay hi uh my name is Leo SPO I'm shean Lee I'm Natalia Carell and we're presenting our Civic Action Project policy proposal that we hope will be implemented in the future so for our policy proposal we will be proposing that counselors will that specialize in the a of Youth be implemented in the schools within the AOH State we also have a petition that has more than 50 signatures has more than 50 signatures from our school as well as our petition we also took a survey of the Cypress high school students and I will be sharing a couple of the questions as well as the results um so the one of the first questions we have is do you believe that there are enough resources at Cyprus high school for career students with uh 83.1% of students saying no and 16.9% of students saying yes um and then for another question we have do you think that our school would benefit from having a counselor that specializes in helping queer youth with a resounding 93.

here here and Dennis Bender is out um Mrs Buchanan will you please lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance yes right hand over your heart ready begin Al to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic it stands one nation under God indivisible with Li and justice for all kie do we have any public comments pertaining to close session we do not okay we need to go into close session to discuss the following people Personnel expulsion case number 12 2324 through expulsion case um 1423 to 24 conference on litigation 10 cases government code section 54956 A current litigation cds1 11183 and 20 22956 Civ SB 211 1303 222 0303 221 8676 222 2314 073 and 23 22171 government code sections 549 54.5 subsection C and 54 9566 subsection D subsection D and subsection e subsection one anticipated litigation one case 20212 2020 2105 public employees discipline dismissal release reassignment transfer leave title certificated and classified employee public employees appointment resignation retirement reduction title certificated and classified employees number five conference with labor negotiator a agency negotiator Dustin Conrad employee organization Valley Unified Teachers Association conference with labor negotiator agency negotiator Dustin Conrad employee organization California School Employees Association conference with real property negotiator government code 56.5 point8 negotiating parties Matthew schulenberg Apple Valley Unified School security matters government code section 54957 consult with Apple Valley UniFi School District Chief of Police Superintendent evaluation and I asked for a motion to go into close session so move second all in favor any opposed okay we had to close good evening this my Pap calling the meeting to order roll call Mr um Ry I'm here Mr gar uh Ry here Mrs Amanda Mr Bender is out and I'm Maria okara uh Frank will you please lead us in the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible for libery and justice for all well good evening everyone and thank you for being here before we get started I would like to say that the board appreciates and supports our educational Partners input at our meetings engagement by members of the public and Civic Ma and Civic matters is the Cornerstone of our democracy everyone should have a chance to express the opinions within the guidelines the board has established for its meetings so that we are able to conduct the meeting effectively and efficiently during the meeting there will be time for the public to comment on matter not on the agenda in addition members of the public May comment on specific agenda items after I as your board president ask for public comments on an item until it is your turn to speak or if you are here just to observe the meeting please refrain from any behavior that prevents others from participating in the meeting Mee or that disrupts the board's ability to conduct the business of the board once again thank you very much for taking your time to join us this evening and to be a participant in this duty of serving our students and our educational Community we will now begin with the student report desert NOS Elementary School Mina Kalisha and Edward rudu [Applause] good evening board members cabinet and members of the public I'm Edward R and this is Mina C we are sixth grade sixth grade students at Desert n Elementary School we are here to tell you about some things we are doing at Desert nlls Elementary School this year this is my third year in student council and I'm so excited to be representing the school student council and booster club have been working hard to keep us excited about coming to school wait in October we are we were busy with spirit days for Red Ribbon Week and ended with our very first truck wa trunker treat which we are hoping is the start of a new tradition it was so much fun seeing all the students and parents as well dressed in in their costumes in December we had another spirit week and our TK classes had a Christmas concert we participated in kindness week where we had a spirit day for each day and every grade level contributed to kindness around our campus this this week we are participating in r Across America we we have spirit days every day as well in class we have been working hard to build our stand stand sorry and use strategies to solve real real world problems we are improving our reading skills as we learn around learn about the world around us and investigates the science of the world we live in most importantly we are working on being part of our school community and showing respect and consideration for others thank you for your time and all you do to help our school have a great night um the things we are passing out um student council made for you [Laughter] guys thank you so much I love the pictures thank you very much thank you getting a donut U Mr Conrad's really excited about this because he loves succulents he's probably the only one up here that can figure out how to save it that was Kylie so much thank you very much that's beautiful thank you CIA Academy Trevor quick and Elan Rodriguez [Applause] good evening good evening members of the school board school district office faculty parents and fellow students As We Gather here today we are deeply honored to stand before you as members of our student body at Candy Academy my name is Trevor quick and my name is Elana Rodriguez Cora we are honored to serve as the voice of our school we are here to share highlights of all the great things that students at cindia have accomplished experienced and enjoyed so far this year we would we would have to sorry we would have loved to fill this space with all of our peers to share this experience but we know that could not have been achieved with the time and space we have so instead we have a short we have a short video highlighting all the great things good evening everyone I'm David alala the ASB adviser at Sandy Academy and I'm thrilled to be starting this video out with you all sandy Academy is field of incredible students and dedicated staff members and I'm proud to be a part of it our students and staff consistently show their dedication to Excellence and it is an honor to work alongside them together we're focused on creating a positive inclusive environment where everyone can succeed thank you for having us here today and here are some of our student highlights so far this [Music] year hi my name is Amaya W TBO my My Favorite Things was 100 days ofation rotations because it was funny my name is AIA s MAA and I am in first grade and my favorite thing is here was our field trip to town hall in Apple Valley it was my favorite because I got to see firefighters and police cars and I learned about Community jobs hi I'm Dexter and I am am in second grade my favorite thing this year is going to Paul because I love performing hi I am Callie and I am in second grade my favorite thing this year was going to the Apple Valley science Innovation Center because we got to learn about science hi I'm lesie I'm in third grade my favorite thing is the spirit weeks but my favorite spirit week is the Halloween parade because I liked everyone's costumes hi I'm Heath and I'm in the fourth grade and I'm excited for the Calico fi trip coming up because I've never been to a ghost town hello my name is Chase Lombard and I'm in the fifth grade and the my favorite field trip is the sawas factory because we get to paint we get to do picture frames the food was good I just really liked it hi my name is L and I am in sixth grade my favorite things that have happened in sixth grade are the P trip because of all the fun activities and the memorable moments that I will cherish forever my next favorite thing in sixth grade was the science museum in La it was fascinating to see everything my next favorite thing are the dances our ASB Representatives do a great job setting up the whole thing and also making sure everyone has a great time my last and final favorite thing to do in sixth grade are the plays every school year our sixth grade does our school does plays for the fourth through e8th grade to do for example last year was a little mermaid while this year is the is Lion King and because I'm such a theater nerd I enjoy being in these plays every year hi my name is z and I'm in I'm in the seventh grade and I've been in a for eight years my favorite part about a is when I went at the seminar Dino County Fair and I usually get first place uh last year got first place when I showed my chicken onx um I showed her in kindergarten when I also got first place hi my name is Jeremiah Garcia I'm in the seventh grade my favorite thing about this year was poly Mountain because of the tree climbing and the Mountain hiking it was a fun experience hi I'm Isaac I'm in the seventh grade and my favorite thing this school year is being able to perform in the honor bands at Oak Hills because I can play in front of a bunch of people hi my name is Dam I'm Creator one of my favorite things was to to go to iFly I was on the basketball team volleyball team it was fun and um I participated in ASB Camp um I was a teacher Aid um yeah and I like spirit week because I got to come to school that's Spiderman hi I'm Avery I'm a senior at alab Valley high school and I work here at Sandy in the shadow pack um it my second year and I'm now like seen as a leader um I absolutely love this experience I get to teach the kids math in this program called math pack where they get challenging problems I love the relationships I've built all the kids I get to teach the work experience with the office the other adults and overall it's just a good program to [Music] be to be safe offer respect responsibly and by example again we want to express our gratitude for the opportunity to present at the board today it has been an honor to show you a glimpse of all the great things going on at Sandia thank you for your time and attention have a great night and put you guys' goodie bags on the table oh is that them the ones I give us this cute stuff thank you very much High Desert Premier ishmail [Applause] Solis okay you it's good thank you for the thing well anyways my sister's probably watching I don't know where the camera is or wherever it is but oh well yeah my sister's probably watching so she's probably gonna make fun of me later if I mess up but it's all right uh good evening president oakar board members superintendent Nelson and executive cabinet last week superintendent Nelson and assistant superintendent schoser came to speak with our student advisory team I'm so sorry I was not able to be there with you guys I heard the meeting went well and the students were able to talk to Mrs Smith and Miss Garcia about bettering our school I'm looking forward to seeing what changes are made before the year ends I hope to see you more colors really soon last week we also had visitors from Apple Valley high school and the district nurses to train a group of students with stop to bleed 23 students will receive stop to bleed certificates good job to everyone who got one this month our students went to several places to learn through experience some of our history students went to the Museum of Tolerance to get a better understanding about what happened during the Holocaust I'm pretty sure Mr Hoge took him right there he's right there but PR sure you took him to there uh our counselor Mr gon took students to Victor Valley College so they could get a better look at the college's programs such as nursing construction and welding programs we also took a group of students to check out local companies from the Victor Valley area at the fairgrounds students were able to check out the job fair that Victor Motors hosted and check out companies such as avionics fire the fire department Victor Valley Transit Chick-fil-A Aerospace and Jack in the Box they were also able to participate in workshops that were provided to learn how to they were provided to learn how to complete applications and interviews next week our middle school program will attend the secure the bag youth conference at Victor Valley College bag stands for Behavior attendance grades and it's hosted by Young Visionaries in the county of San berino where they will work with the canyon Brothers Gabriel and Javon these groups will complete workshops for mental health awareness conflict resolution and building healthy relationships a few Club updates that we have are Esports they entered Apex Legends and Super Smash Bro tournaments our golf club is meeting at Apple Valley Country Club to learn how to play I hope you all had a great spring break and a well-deserved break I'm looking forward to seeing you all next month and talk more about our school owls have a great rest of your night everybody thank you Ismail gr Hills High School Hannah for good evening executive cabinet board members and attendees my name is Hannah for the junior class president granite and I have a lot of wonderful things to tell you about tonight last Sunday our Avid held their first annual Thrift Madness event at our school there was everything from food vendors free clothes and pajamas from the family center clothes and items being sold by Avid ASB swab creative crafts peer helpers and a lot more as well as a ton of community vendors selling items from purses to jewelry to small student own to small student owned businesses selling personally designed um clothing brands I really hope at least some of you had a chance to attend it was an incredible turnout we are really excited to see how this event will grow in the years to come Avid also held a field trip for freshman in the program they toured Cal State Fullerton and Cal poon at both schools Avid was able to have tour guides who Grand Hills alumni as well as past Avid students as for ASB we've been very busy two weekends ago we held our winter formal dance at night in New York we had photo booth a dancing robot food trucks snacks and a great DJ for a Valentine's Day fundraiser ASB sold roses at lunch with handwritten notes for our loved ones this Wednesday we held our info meeting for students interested in joining ASB or running for a class office currently ASB is working hard and getting ready for a winter pep Ry which will take place tomorrow morning last week we celebrated our beloved Mrs Hall in the 10y year anniversary of the Granite Hills Family Center sta participated in a weeklong food drive spirit days and Family Center trivia giveaways it was a fun-filled week with being able to recognize all that our family center does for us on our campus also last week students met with superintendent Nelson and assistant superintendent schoser on the student advisory council meeting of the Year students were able to give input on ways to make gr Hills even better and worked with administrators and teachers to record those ideas we look forward to seeing the positive change that opportunity brings in the future I was a part of this group and I think it was extremely helpful to not only staff but to us as students we were able to hear a lot about other a wider range of variety of things happening on our campus and how we can help to advocate for ourselves and others and we look forward to next year our CTE programs have been busy with competitions and skills USA prep our medical pathway took first place overall at the mdcp medical competition last week and our Skate Program participated in physics day at notb Farm our programs will be sending over 36 students to compete at skills at State and skills USA next month our dance class has got to go on a Disney trip on Tuesday for a dance workshop and Leadership event theater is working very hard on getting ready to perform me and girls the musical and it'll be fetched so make sure you guys come out I'll give I'll have more updates on the dates for that for you guys next month and as a member of the cast I can very confidently say it will be an incredible show some of our performing art students will be attending the C CLL Statewide grid Summit in LA on March 14th this is a California based initiative the grid introduces young people to new ways of thinking about creativity problem solving skills and current Pathways there will be professional workshops and Stateway competitions for the students next week will be a busy one at Granite Hills as we race in the spring break we're hosting the eighth grade visits on Monday and Tuesday where students will get to preview CTE programs electives and get a glimpse of their future High School experience Wednesday's High School awareness night for parents and families to see all that granted has to offer incoming freshman and Thursday we'll host District Phil day as part of our Special Olympics unified Champion schoool collaborative students from both alpab Valley high school and Granite Hills will partner with 252 students with special needs from preschool to adult transition to participate in a day of games and activities that showcases all of our District's values in a single event we hope that you can join us for all the fun as for g hills Athletics all of our programs are thriving I don't have a very detailed update for you tonight but I will next month I promise but for now that's it so as always thank you for your support and mun and gray lead the way Apple Valley High School Sophia [Applause] [Music] brand thank you so much good evening members of the board and attendees my name is Sophia Brandt and I'm the Apple Valley High School Associated student body line president today I'll be sharing with you what our students have been up to as well as some of our goals for the upcoming month for the first time in program history our girls soccer team moved on to CIF division 3 finals and won the title we are so incredibly proud of our girls and let them know with two pep rallies and a special sendoff from some of our elective classes they then won their first round of regionals and afterwards we put on a parade around the school to celebrate those talented CIF Champs girls basketball also played in the first round of CIF earlier this month and jayen Cerna and Tyler Mulford competed in the individual CIF wrestling championship we are so proud of our talented sundevil athletes aaval Unified School District is part of ND mdcp Mountain Desert career Pathways a collaboration of districts to help enhance CTE education and they hosted many competitions our students competed in the last month including for medical construction welding and the hackathon which we were able to host at avhs our construction team won third place and Welding had the highest scores as a team and the highest scoring individual Jacob Lawler who is also a sundevil speaking of CTE programs we have 167 students who are advancing to State competitions for skills USA across 46 different competitions there were also many top three regional placements with 39 gold 41 silver and 19 bronze medals earned we can't wait to see how State goes continuing to prep our sun Noels for Life After High School colleges like Cal State Bakersfield Cal State San Bernardino Cal Baptist University Northern Arizona University isua Pacific vbc and Park University as well as representatives from the Army Navy Marines and Air Force and local businesses like Starbucks the gym and more came to talk to our students at our College and Career Fair to inspire their Futures our ASB Disney trip was a great time and we gained Insight on how leadership and teamwork intersect with our everyday work on campus for Valentine's Day freshman sold and distributed Valentine's grams and one of our weekly challenge groups gave students the opportunity to make free Valentine's cards at lunch we put on the buff and tough volleyball game where Junior and senior boys competed against each other and were coached by our volleyball girls but sadly for me as a class of 2024 student the Juniors won tomorrow we will have a St Patrick's Day celebration since it's falls on spring break this year and for the only time during the entire school year we're encouraging our Sun Devils to wear green ASV will also be guides at incoming as incoming eighth graders from middle schools come in tour avhs and learn about the wide range of programs and activities we have to offer on Monday and Tuesday and then we'll be hosting our um High School awareness night on Wednesday lion has been working hard on Mr soval preparations and it's finally the month of the show with the help of camp we filmed an amazing promotional video that you can find on our Instagram I've been teaching the five boys their opening routine of a mix of country songs and right now um it's looking a bit interesting but they're working very hard so on Friday it'll look good I'm confident um and our whole class has been painting huge backdrops to set the stage of a western town we've collected sponsors for many incredible local businesses and we will have our setup and run through next Thursday before the show on Friday it will be held in the gym starting at 6m and I would highly recommend coming to watch and vote for this year's winner over spring break some of the Spanish students including myself are traveling to Costa Rica to learn about the rich culture and practice the language I'm so grateful to the Spanish department and avhs as a whole for providing other students and me with the opportunity to travel abroad and Gage firstand experience while we are still in high school there are so many exciting things happening at Apple Valley high school and I want to thank you all for your continued support we couldn't give our students any of these incredible opportunities without you I hope you all enjoy your spring break our last one before the home stretch and thank you for your time thank you so much thank you to all of the student speakers um I think I just switch this around can we comment and then are is that okay yeah okay so um I'm looking at making some changes on the AG on the agenda so I wanted the students to see the presentation that is coming after this um so I'm not going to release the students as as yet um do you want to move do you want to move the presentations right now and then we'll do our comment yes okay let's do that so can we amend that can is that okay with the board to bring the recognitions forward com we are yes we are that's not going okay I name my computer can I have the [Music] yes Mr schenberg was waiting for him to get I wasna say no he's not allowed right here right okay right up by [Music] yes yeah I think Jamie is in the audience is Jamie here Jamie how did I miss [Applause] you I know this is not what you like right right that's why because you're always standing someplace in the room you're never seated that's what I'm gonna say about you um Jamie ceras is the custodian up at Sycamore Rock School that's why the cheering section is here and they should be while I've been in the district for many years what I always see Jamie doing is just being there ready to do whatever is needed and what I recognize about him is he is always valued as a partner at that school like if there's a staff meeting Jamie's there if there's a decision to be made Jim's there but just like this he's quiet and behind the scenes however ever on a day last month we had a student that choked in the multi-purpose room and Jamie didn't hesitate to step in and do the heck maneuver and take care of that kiddo and so I heard about it I asked to see the video because there was a video in the room and I was just overwhelmed with emotion that this is what we do in schools and I was so proud to say to the board that we are going to to reinstitute our recognition of employees regarding our values of dignity service authenticity and Community by recognizing you as one of the first people in our district with that award and I just want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart I'm sure that parent and that child and everybody at your school are so proud of you so thank [Applause] you [Music] w and then if we while we're waiting for this can we have Natalie come up Natalie [Applause] khong so a few weeks ago Mr Conrad and I received an email from a parent in our district who's also a staff member and on the night of the event at the school right before Christmas he were having a performance that one of her students was going to participate in but unfortunately he ended up in the emergency room and later was transported to Linda where again the emotion of what these people do um and there's so many teachers in the audience so this is so exciting for me because I know so many of you represent these same values Natalie went down to the hospital took her student some of his favorite things to do and um continued to stay in contact and make sure that everything was okay and the parent just wanted us to know that not only are you a rock star those were her words but you also I'm going to I I need to go there for a minute um you also provide just calm and um gentle support to your students that allow him to thrive in your class and so again what a representation of Apple Valley UniFi School District's value of dignity authenticity community and service so we appreciate you come all right uh we're going to go on superintendent comments since our last board meeting we held our first African-American um parent advisory District advisory meeting um our an our district elcap advisory meeting which is our um daak Community um group and then we H continue our work with our ethnic studies committee um we have met three times we'll meet the fourth time next week um yesterday I sat on the sanino County student advis panel students from across the high desert presented Solutions in response to the S Nino County vital signs initiative several of the presentations were related to access of Medical Care Health Services mental health and um the relationship that that not having those provided um add to the drug abuse in our community the presentations were well planned and thoughtful it was interesting to be on the panel I was on because the same week we had had um a community night regarding suicide prevention and while the group that came to to see the presentation was very small um the information that Stan Collins provided as the presenter um is something that we will continue to offer to our community we're looking at a different um venue because we know that talking about suicide is a hard topic and yet we know that based on the kids presentations yesterday it's a a needed topic and so we'll encourage our families to um log in when we offer it and um know what the the information is so that we can stop people from not talking about it if they need help the kids talked about the AV the absd superintendent advisory that has been going on Hannah spoke of it isma spoke of it we have Apple Valley next week um Trevor's in the room Mia Mia's in the room is in the room um and they have participated in student advisory has Trevor left I don't see you Trevor Trevor is one of our students that um participates in the elementary student advisory and he's one of these kids that um right off the bat in our advisory we knew that he was a servant leader um Whenever there is anything going on in the room that creates any waste Trevor gets up and goes and gets a trash can and starts walking around and collecting these things and that happened the first advisory it happened the second advisory and during the second advisory other students asked if they could do the same thing and so I just want to recognize him in this room of um along with all of his peers and others that um that doesn't go unnoticed it's not because we're doing it in our school district it's because he learned this at home and so wherever your your group is it's here to cheer for you um good job guys and Trevor I'm glad that um Elon is here because I think he's gonna replace you right when you're when you're too old to come to advisory for K8 I think he'll probably replace you so um just so you know uh good job you guys all of the speakers were amazing gr congratulations to um the abhs sundevil girls varsity soccer team coach Nicole Stevens and assistant coach Daniel tazzo um who took the CIF division 3 as we heard from um Sophia Mr Nelson and I went on a date night to Oak Park to watch History being made it was a two and a half hour drive but it was well worth the drive um they moved on to the California Southern section regionals and played in the finals last weekend in Granada Hills where they ended their season after extra time and then went to a penalty kick um round I think the quote in the paper by C uh Cadence honestly it might her quote was honestly it might sound bad but I'm not sad I'm so proud of this team represents the heart and resilience of the team um I think it was I think that it is awesome that in a month recognized as women's history that we have a female team take a CIF Championship led by a female coach again with a female athletic director and cheering them on from the stands were two of our female board members and the Fe superintendent Mr Nelson took me on another date he drove to Granada Hills I also um was sad to miss hackathon and the welding and constructions trades and Automotive competitions because I don't miss those but I was on a board meeting um for one of our jpas and was not able to attend but I did watch for um the results and was thrilled to see that um another one of our student advisers Jacob lar um was the advanced welder and um ala Valley took the overall welding uh and again an all girl all female constructions trades group took third place in the overall competition um I also um loved going over to Granny Hills High School to um celebrate the 10y year anniversary of the family center and um Zyra Hall um they surprised her with quite a little party um that some of the students had planned I was able to participate in Across America at two School sites nothing like being tongue tied and now have a group of fourth graders at DK in Mrs Brand's class who think that I should be able to wrap the Cat in the Hat so when the challenge is made I told them I have absolutely no rhythm I definitely can't rap but I'm up for the challenge so before the end of the year Zoe says she'll go with me Kylie doesn't know she's going as the other thing because Zoe says she's gonna be thing one Kylie can be thing to and I'm in a wrap the Cat in the Hat there will not be video of this event spring break is around the corner and I knew that the students and staff are all ready from for some rest as we turn the corner in preparation and of another school year end so I hope everybody takes that time and relaxes thank you Mrs Buchanan thank you um first to all of the students thank you so much for coming um you you guys did fantastic like you always do um I did have a question for Hannah when did you say Mean Girls was I didn't see it on our calendar April oh that's why April do you know okay I'm just G to write it down April someday in April April okay I will it's I wrote April I I I caught that part I just missed the April you were you were moving faster than my brain was tonight all right um so I did um I made it out to Vanguard this month I got to see some of the Middle School boys basketball games um i t timed it so I actually got three of the schools two games um so it was Vanguard versus sitting Bowl first and then sitting bowl and Mariana so that was kind of neat had to see a little bit of um of those three schools two games for the boys um I also had the opportunity to read for read Across America um which was really nice um as you guys know I'm a I I get to teach the bigger kids so I got to take the morning off took some uh personal necessity time and came over here and got to read just the littles um and it was just it was so enjoyable because uh I went back to work and I worked my whole day and then I came in on Monday and our security guard came in and said I have to show you something and he pulls out his phone and he says my wife sent this to me and I needed to show you like our grandson left something in um our car this weekend and it was a little note that I had written to each of the kids just saying like thank you so much for letting me read to your class and it just so turned out that the one class at the one school that I randomly got assigned happened to have um a grandson in it from the school where I actually work as well so it was really neat it was like all keing full circle um congratulations to the Apple Valley High School girls team uh we we did get a chance to make it out there as was mentioned um I wish I had known about some of the previous games um before they had actually been played we we were getting the scores afterwards when they were winning and we would get the yay they won it's so great and so we were um as board members celebrating that after the fact but we did know about that last game so we made sure we um got out there to support them and um you know they just it may not have ended the way they had hoped but they we are so dang proud of them um as a board all of us because it was just it was phenomenal how far they did make it and it was a nailbiter um when we got home um I was the driver and everybody else in the car was asleep but the next morning my 13-year-old daughter who is a goalie um for re soccer could not stop telling her dad all about the the goalies um for Apple Valley so if you know them make sure you tell them she could not stop talking about them um and then just the last thing um I know one of the students mentioned it in the video but um congratulations to all of the the students that made it into the county honor band and performed because I know I did um see that also um on the video but then also show up on on social media so just congratulations to all of our musicians in the district um sometimes they get a little bit overlooked too with all the sports and so that's fantastic that we had I think it was was it 26 27 students do you know off the top of your head you remember I know it was a lot that made it into the county honor band which it is competitive because I don't like to talk about it but when I was in Middle School or high school I auditioned twice to make it and I never made it so I tried it's hard yeah I never made it but congratulations to them so that's it for me thank you so much uh Mr Ry thank you I just like to to add what to what superintendent Nelson mentioned about the uh student advisory panel that a number of us were able to participate in and then I just wanted to to inform the public of of what was going on there and the purpose of that was student presentations to gain valuable Insight from a students's p perspective on priorities identified uh you know what in in other words it was leaders it was um board members it was superintendents it was Community leaders hearing from the students and uh the purpose of it is to uh Focus students on empowering their voice and encouraging Civic engagement and I think all of us who were there can say that we were so impressed with with the students with their presentations with the the thoughts that they shared they spent months preparing for the presentations that that they gave us and we were very very impressed and I just just want to recognize the students from from Apple Valley High School who participated in that it was Audrey gabbe Kaden Holloway Samantha janz regard uh Rodriguez Nelly Gonzalez De la Rosa Faith robbar Kad jido uh Effie Aila Tiffany hoing Johnson Nick Jung and col Nelson just just uh outstanding uh student presentation and like I say we were we were so impressed with with how our Apple Valley High School students uh did and they they represented our our district exceedingly well so so thank you for all the students who worked so hard on that uh I had the chance the last month to to visit the Apple Valley Center for Innovation and I saw the the the Vanguard sixth graders taking a field trip there and I just want to to commend Mr Gillette and all the staff there for the the tremendous knowledge that they shared with the students uh they were sharing information on planets and stars and uh galaxies and constellations the students were engaged in team building exercises critical thinking exercises and I could tell just by looking at the students just just by by sitting on the ground next to them as we were in that inflatable Planetarium and all all this this great uh information was being shared I could just tell that the the expertise and enthusiasm on staff really made a big difference so thank you for all the the the people at ABCI Dr Gillette and all your staff were working so hard every single day very very impressive presentation uh as as was mentioned as um Sophia mentioned just want to compliment uh and congratulate all who worked so hard on the the college fair College and Career Fair there at abhs uh as she mentioned 52 exhibitors participated including representatives from from our local town the US military um local employers AV fire department a number of colleges and so on uh there were there was a very good participation on the basis of our students and I know our students a lot of them had their eyes opened as to the opportunities that are available to them so thank you for everyone who organized that and a thank you for all the teachers who brought their classes over and I also want to commend Mrs Pratt at at Apple Valley High School for the extand outstanding work that the CTE program is doing there I had the chance to to visit with her last month and she gave me a tour of the engineering tech classes the graphics design classes animal science and AD media arts Machining and Welding medical Pathways construction Food Service uh just just so impressive what our teachers are are doing and how they're motivating our students to excel in such a way uh I I learned that 79% of the students enrolled in CTE programs at Apple Valley High earn official industry certifications in things such as those tangible job skills in things like a welding um EKG an Anis and so on so our our students are being prepped and are graduating with real world job skills that they can immediately translate into jobs so I want to say a big thank you to Mrs parat and all the CTE staff at uh Apple Valley High School for all their hard work um and all their constant grant writing uh you know a lot of times we don't see all the hard work that goes on behind the scenes writing grants on their own time coming in on the weekends you know the the a folks come in on the weekends that their pigs still got to eat their chickens and cows still have to eat so they're they're working seven days a week there on campus and I want to say a special thank you to the food service class because they allowed me to sample their chocolate chip cookies that just came out of the out of the oven and I just just want to inform the food service class that that in the future if if they ever need a volunteer taste tester I am I am more than happy to sacrifice my time and and go over there and support your program so call me up I I will anytime uh day or night I will happily be a a unofficial uh food taster because you students there do excellent work so so thank you very much for everything that you guys all the teachers and the staff are doing on a regular basis that's thank you Mr Ry okay thank you madam president I um I'd like to thank uh we had the presentation with Natalia and Jamie U did I say it wrong good it's Natalie where is she at where is she Natalia she's over there she's there she in the back there well I heard you say it but uh you know this is uh especially Jamie you're gonna find that you know when you save a person's life especially a young person it's going to stay with you forever like a video you know you're going to replay this and then for that person that you saved that life of they're going to remember you for the rest of their life so it's very an honorable thing that you did and so you should really um be commended and I know it's you know you don't consider yourself a hero you just did what comes natural to you as a person but um that's pretty remarkable what you what you did at that school so from uh from me I wanted to thank you because it's very honorable thing so that's all I have thank you um I've got to start by thanking the students who came out today to speak to us uh and to share all of the marvelous things happening at your schools um it's not easy to uh share uh in front of all these people in one room it's not like your classroom but I'm really impressed with um your presentation your Poise um and your presence um it is such a great experience uh to see you come in and and give us a little nugget of what happens at your school um thank you so much thank you from the bottom of my heart you are doing such a great job sh um Mrs Buchanan and I went to see the CIF Championship as you all know I'm from another country so soccer is our world uh and so that's where you go and you talk as if nobody's watching um and so I had to be reminded that I'm a board member watch your mouth um but by your daughter yes I was in front of her not correct her uh but I I actually enjoyed it I enjoyed the speed with which those young girls ran across the field and how they tackled and they played very clean game I must say because I I felt that the coach must have known the other team uh and favored them somehow um but our kids stayed focused um so I personally believe that they played with all of their heart and they gave us a best uh best game so far I'm hoping that next year we can up our game and and anybody that comes our way we have them uh thank you so much to Appa Valley High School you did a great job um representing us um outside of here uh we went to the Civic engagement um um exercise at Hisperia School District uh I must say that as students were very professional um they were very well dressed their coaches did a fabulous job preparing them and so when you put them on the stage and you see how they line up and you can almost think that those kids were going for a job interview well dressed have Poise well prepared and I couldn't have asked for a better District to represent us a better group of kids to represent us amazing um uh we went to read Across America at Vanguard I was truly honored uh to uh be invited to come and read to those kids and um and I thought they will never understand me because of my accent but those kids were so engaged they participated they let me pronounce words that didn't sound right um but they didn't mind either uh but of course I was also teach um reading in a classroom of one of the teachers that I consider my daughter Natalia uh so it was easier to go into her classroom and actually pretend that I was actually back as a teacher it was good she G live left me a grandma chair so it was really perfect um and then then I went to Suicide Prevention um at grer Hills it was by far one of the best experiences I've had and I wish everybody would have gone to just see that to hear um some of the things that we ought to be aware of when we are dealing with uh the young young people and the attention we need to pay to attent to the details uh because sometimes you could miss a little little detail that could save a child's life but I wish we would do this again and hopefully do it so that we will do it in an evening like this and maybe during board meeting and have them get a little Snippets of it uh because our children are worth saving um whatever it is that is out there that can save them um I'm all for it um and then to um conclude um I did not go to a lot of schools this year um this this month because my life came tumbling down um this last this this this last month and so my strength has come from waking up every morning and thinking about every single one of the kids in the school district and they give me a reason to get up and go uh and so um I want to thank you again and in terms of skills USA I am extremely proud of the kids who have who have advanced um we have um probably about 75 um medals um that are 7 75 79 medals um some are group medals so there will be more kids in that group uh that won in skills USA um I went when they were doing the wood shop portion of it because I thought I could be it could be my next career to be able to do wood stuff because I tend to break things with wood and I think I can repair it if I just know how to put the nail in the right spot um but um before I get off I'm going to ask each and every one of you to please keep my family in your prayers because I have had the most tremendous loss this last week this last month uh to lose three members of my family in one day is a little too hard but I thank all of you who have stepped off stepped up and helped me along and you children are the reason I wake up every morning and want to be here thank you again again and then and we are going to take this time to excuse the kids so that we may go on with the business of of for running the district thank you so much you guys can do your homework now yeah yeah I took it kind of more serious let me goad please see Natalia oh I was say let me go see natal she came [Music] upal what's that hello baby girl that at she gave me a catalog into bu a shoe I bought Amy oh and I got this shoe okay California School Employees Association CA Nicholas Garrett no Apple Valley Unified Teachers Association avuta Karen Sabers I'm back okay oh we're good no no we're not I'm under are you okay good evening superintendent Nelson esteemed board members cabinet and distinguished a audience it is my pleasure to present to you tonight the newly appointed member board exec board members as well as reind reintroduce I can't even speak tonight the returning members of our exec board I'm filled with enthusiasm and pride as I showcase this exceptional group each member exemplifies integrity and professionalism making our EXA board a source of great confidence and pride Leslie mcnanley is our vice [Music] president treasure is now Amy marks secretary Crystal Anderson ps6 segment director Adrien Cloud ps8 segment director St Wendy Kelly and high school segment director Tim Hol [Applause] grief the exec board members and negotiation team well half of our team because we are now a whole team not two separate teams so half of our team have embarked on a listening tour starting two weeks ago and continuing through May representatives from both teams are visiting schools to listen to the concerns and gather insights on what the staff would like addressed in our upcoming negotiations next January this approach aims to Foster meaningful conversations ensure that all and ensure that all voices are heard Auda is thrilled to announce our participation in the upcoming Children's Day event our teachers will be Distributing books to the children a Trad a tradition we are proud to continue witnessing The Joy on the students faces as they select their preferred books brings us immense happiness I had the opportunity to participate in the community school cohort training along inside the team in February that was in Santa Clara not Santa Clarita it was an enriching experience and we returned inur I can't I'm sorry it's been a day we returned energized and prepared to advance our planning efforts last week we convened again to initiate the development of a presentation for all stakeholders Orlando cido I hope I did I hope I said that right AO you know thank you representing the town of Apple Valley provided valuable Community insights working with this team continues to be a delight I also had the opportunity to participate in the read Across America at Vanguard it was great to be back in a third grade classroom reading to those Littles um Vanguard coaches did an excellent job of organizing the event and their Afterschool art teacher did an amazing job decorating with the student work and her own Creations I was very impressed with that finally there's a daunting topic of health insurance both a vuda exec board and CSEA exec board have had the opportunity to hear a presentation from the high desert Trust about the newly introduced plan referred to as Plan B however we still need to Del into plan C we aim to have our insurance ARR Arrangements finalized by the end of this month beginning of April I wasn't going to say anything but I want to say that today was a day of closure and relief but also a day of sadness um but I want to thank everybody that has sent um their encouraging messages and positive um messages to me um this evening and to our exec board and we just appreciate everybody's support and what we had to go through um we're glad it's Fally come to an end um but thank you for your time have a great spring break and a great evening and solidarity [Applause] Karen the clerk will read out any action taken in closed session yes thank you we had one item which is item B3 Public Employee discipline dismissal release assignment transfer leave certificated and cl classified employees on a motion by Raleigh second by okara we voted 40 to uh approve thank you thank you I need a motion yes I I thought I called that out it was um item oh okay okay okay okay yeah there is a number there okay approve the non- reelection of the following certificated probationary employee number 6190 identified by employee number effective June 30th 2024 and direct at the superintendent or her design give written notice therefore thereof as required by law and then that was a motion by Raleigh a second by opara and it was unanimous vote 4 Z good yeah okay okay then we go to discussion information no oh we need to adopt the agenda the the board May adopt the agenda as is or ADD and or pull items from the consent agenda for discussion and our action I need a motion I'll move the item I'll second all in favor I any opposed okay um District English learner advisory committee deac presented by Patrick Scher as with the better presentations I will not be presenting this instead will be presented by the experts um but I just wanted to take a moment to give thanks to the our district English language advisory committee who serve in the capacity not just in what's listed in the item to give advice for our English learner program they do so much more um this is a powerful group who participates in our district advisory process they've been participants in the ethnic studies development process and really just anything that involves the good the Improvement of our system for children they're there for us and so this um is an opportunity to hear from them some of the things they've put into place this year and to hear from uh Marana Torres who all turn it over to is kind of um how they've been guiding our development of program this year so Mariana will will introduce her team thank you sure yeah we'll make it work I have a teacher voice anyways all right hello board uh and everyone here we just wanted to have a moment to not only present the progress for English Learners in our district I get the pleasure of um working alongside an amazing group of people across the district that supports our English Learners and once a year even though this is kind of by law that we have to do this thing like you know yes it's it's the legal requirement but it's also a wonderful opportunity to actually highlight all the awesome things that our kids our parents our community and everyone here is doing to support our students so um with that said I will go through the legal part of it and then we'll get to the cool part of it where all of the um W with all of the work that they have been doing which has been incredible so we want to talk about proficiency we want to talk about uh reclassifications reclassifications is when those students actually leave our program I know that it's a very weird thing to think about but we technically Ki KI kid kids out of our program and and good reason they're doing so well that they don't need to be in our program anymore so they get to be most of them merging bilinguals and then go on to making sure that they get their seal of by literacy so it's actually one of the coolest programs to be a part of so um we're going to be talking about right now we're serving across our district approximately any day of the week a few more a few less 1542 students and this year um they actually were you know I I I know I'm talking educational lingo but we were green people we were green we have been working hard towards that green and so it's really exciting I I know like I swear my husband looked at me and goes why are you like screaming and I'm like we made green but um with that said we actually increase 8.3% and um in in diet words um that that that was that was a the first 20 pounds it was amazing it's awesome so um 46 uh 46.4% of our students either made one band or they maintain a four and that is amazing um they have been working so hard in making sure that they handle their business and you're going to see it across last year which was kind of a rough year we were still trying to figure out you got to remember we're a year behind so so you guys got to stay with me even though it's forensic science um you know we R designated 69 students because you know coming back having them in school and everything else this year so far we have done 68 and we have 126 candidates that are pending finalist ation of their reclassification they are um they are just doing everything that they need to do and then some so it's it's very very proud just to give you an idea because most people don't realize this most of our students do not stay in our program as a matter of fact um almost 38.4% to be exact but really about 40% of our students actually leave us and they leave us because they have all the things that they need to be successful without us and and that makes us proud we still watch them for four years and make sure that they don't fall but you know what they they're doing what they need to do but 500 of those 1500 students have only been in the either in the California educational system or enrolled in school for three or less years so you know every three years about onethird is brand new kiddos so so we want to make sure that we keep it that way we are working with our El TS which are our long-term English Learners to make sure that we provide other supports to make sure that those gaps that they might have that might be might be part of language development or they might be other learning gaps that might be keeping them from becoming redesignated that we're working with them differently to make sure that they don't get there so I this is all our data that we want to always compare which is how our English Learners are doing in the Casp uh in the English language arts and math this again part of that real legal thing that we need to do uh but we wanted to compare the three groups because this is actually what the dashboard shows you they show you our English Learners they show you our redesignated or reclassified English Learners and our englishon students and you can see that um in the numbers are redesignated students once leave our program are very well prepared to make sure that they stay at grade level so in math you'll see a similar pattern remember the difference from met is kind of like you know the the distance from that measure so we want to make sure that we continue to push in the right direction we wanted to also include and highlight the fact that our students that are English Learners and all students um our district is very much on track and um and utilizing all of our resources to make sure that there is no that there's no Gap that there's no disparity and so you're going to see these in regards to ours looks actually a little bit higher because we continue to improve and close that Gap so as you can see very much side by side they're they're doing very well now this is the coolest part that I get to tell you we have been working we worked in the Dack on goals and making sure that we were able to do this and and I am proud to say that so I had a group of four parents only two of which are here today they came they saw we work through the tool in order to get to Blue and what it was that how we needed to break it up and how much the percentage was and we did the first one here which was our e goal um that night but they insisted that we met on Friday with coffee and pulce and that we did the rest of the indicators for all English Learners so that we could make sure that we had something to present back to the board and to the deck in order to have their voice heard and that's the kind of work so I have to tell you you know the first 10 to 20 pounds and a Diet are hard and then they get a little harder because you know you have to continue to to figure out how to how how to continue to make progress right that's the only equation I could give it to because I know that the struggle is real on that one too but um they figured out that if we make 6.3% every single year for the next three years we are going to be in blue and for us to be in blue is is the goal because every child Des serves the opportunity to to to make sure that they have what they need to be successful so I wanted to present that work because that was them and their work and they want to make sure that they have that with that said this is the same group that um this is the same group that has been leading the church and making sure that we have the opportunities for our emerging bilinguals and um you know when we talk about why it is that you want to become bilingual that developing of strong thinking skills the uh the cultivating ofg grading cultural awareness that using logic all of the research says that you know it's really helpful in understanding not just math concepts and problems but ises increases that reading comprehension and and even helps you like less likely to get Alzheimer's I know it's weird but the research actually backs it up not just that but it help it's helpful when it comes to to making sure that we have um opportunities ac across the globe right as a global Society so we wanted to make sure that we had the opportunity to to to mention something that's very exciting to us I got to read um on Friday at Vanguard as well but I got to read Ro to the dual immersion class which was pretty awesome um we have our first Kinder class and um that started at Vanguard uh prep and uh we have a full class and and if it's it's it's a joy to actually be in there and listen to these kiddos learning together and uh and she's doing what they're doing um I was talking uh I was talking to the staff there and I was surprised to find out that um they they shared with me that out of 157 applications 51 of them actually uh requested the dual immersion program for next year I was like yes this is awesome so uh one of the you one of the things that we wanted to to highlight is is is what a wonderful opportunity is for our students but more than anything else is because it creates that Pathway to biliteracy um we have Spanish and French classes that are offered to seventh and eighth graders there and then both of our high schools have French and Spanish classes as well as Spanish for Spanish Beaker classes and every year I report this to you guys but this is the first year that is exciting that I get to actually tie it in all the way to elementary school and so it's it's pretty cool because this is one of our California College and Career indicators and um as one of those College and Career indicators that get them ready for the next steps um we actually have 45 students that that that were able to get that by literate seal in the fall and we have another 43 students that are taking the test now in the end so that will probably be the biggest number of bilingual biliterate seal of by literacy recipients that we will have across our district so I'm sorry I took so long but there's a lot of really great news to share I will turn it over to our wonderful parents I have Marita Aragon from uh she has a student at Vanguard and one at Apo valy high school and I have Felipe ernandez from Granite Hills um Miss syia Vanos our amazing teacher on assignment is going to be [Applause] translating ladies and gentlemen members of the board staff and parents present I hope you're having a good evening my name is Maron at this time I'd like to speak a little bit about um what we've learned at the um at the past meetings regarding the uh ethnic studies I find um or I I'm happy to see um this plan uh to be developed at the at the schools I feel that it's important that that our students don't lose um the roots from um The Roots that they learn about their Roots their cultural um and their Origins as well as learning about other cultures and other races in hopes that this will prevent future um interracial um clashes as we've seen in the past years I believe that putting this course into place will will will help future [Music] Generations existentes regardless of how this program is implemented whether it be a standalone uh course or an integrated course I believe this will uh be a great help always whenn if and when uh as long as we keep the course in context maintaining um maintaining respect uh good Concepts values and um morals Morales okay while maintaining um again respect uh good Concepts values and morals thank you for allowing me to allowing me the time to speak and I believe it's a great opportunity for other parents who haven't had the opportunity to assist these meetings and learn more about the uh about the topic thank hope you have a good evening bues good evening um board of directors parents and staff I would uh like to reintroduce myself from last year but this time proudly say that I am a I have two students that have redesignated and and graduated from Granite Hills High School thank you I still have one one niece at Granite Hills reclassified and because what she has seen that my children were able to accomplish she wants to go above and beyond that honors classes BC BBC coursework and possibly she really really wants to uh complete her coursework one semester before graduating and all of that is thanks to uh the staff at the schools the teachers and all of the conversations that I'm sure that you all have had gra thank you again I'd like to give thanks again because I've seen all the work that the parents have done um to assist the students that have been [Music] reclassified just like Marana I to get excited when I see the green and if I'm saying it correctly I'm sure you all uh noticed too that we are very close to meeting the standard I apologize to the teachers if I'm asking for a little too much but we're we're requesting that we raise the bar a little bit and shoot for that 8% rather than the 6.33% I get excited and emotional when I think about U the Dual emerging program because I too uh it takes me back and I remember my years in the classroom as well I was asking or telling Mariana that I would love to uh be a vol unteer in that classroom at least once you know once a day if possible but volunteer my time in that classroom I remember when the DLI programs was just a dream that we had and here we are you know excited to complete our first year of a DLI program I've talked to my daughter about the experience we've had regarding the ethnic studies and she's jealous of the fact that he's had an opportunity to be a part of it we're making history thank you again and I'd like to finish with a few words from a an American author oino and aino in his book angel number 12 Day by Day Moment by Moment by moment I I uh okay I get better and better so just I'd like to just reiterate that to the district um day by day Moment by Moment by moment we get better and better thank [Applause] you did I did I mentioned that he was a Kinder teacher in Salvador so you know I was like yes we want volunteers so thank you very much um I know we took longer than than we um that we had anticipated but it's always great to share um is there any questions or anything that I can answer for you guys no okay thank you very [Applause] much presentation on govern budget proposal and second interim uh District financials thank you um I'm going to be up here a couple times tonight but the first presentation I'm going to introduce uh Miss Cindy conle she is our director of fiscal Services uh she's going to speak to you a little bit about the governor's January budget proposal and some of the points that he's proposed and introduced and when she's finished then I will talk about the second interim financials so good evening um in January we um went to the governor's January budget proposal um some of you were there um and heard the same things that we did that the we have a a significant shortfall um at the state level which always trickles down to us um the theme of that was that the governor see says that there's a 30 to4 billion doll budget shortfall the Lao the legislative analyst office says it's almost double that so there's this huge gap um however uh the governor is committed to keeping um the impact of that uh away from education his focus is really on um continuing with the uh learning loss and and providing the the program and the funding for all the stuff that we've done over the past couple years due to the pandemic um the good news is that because of the money that we've received over the last three four years because of the pandemic the big one-time infusions of cash that the state has given us is and with prop 98 we've had higher than usual colas over the past few years and onetime dollars going into that is allow the state to save and put more money into the rainy day fund specifically for times like this so they do have a a savings in the rainy day fund a cushion that they can draw from to help mitigate some of these shortfalls um the bad news is that because of the last couple years of them delaying the tax deadline for people to file their taxes and pay their taxes they moved it from April 15th to October 15th our budget is based on what comes in in April that's what they used to project for the following year with that delay they had to really get creative and project certain amounts of money that they were going to come in without knowing how much actually was going to come in in October last year and the year before then especially last year those tax receipts did not come to fruition that they had based our budget on in June and had approved and that was the enacted budget and they have to figure out how to how to continue to give us the money that they promised us um in 2223 so because of all of this it looks like they actually gave us more money than they should have um we don't know how he's going to fix that problem if he's going to do cuts and we're we're still working through all the details of that school Services doesn't really know either um so we'll have to find out in May a little bit more clarification on that more good news um he's not proposing any Cuts or deferrals to uh to us um either for last year or this year or even for next year um yet exactly yet um it's still early in the in the cycle January is really just the governor's first blush and what he thinks is going to happen right now they're in the middle of negotiating between now and may they'll they'll be negotiating with the legislature um and the Lao will provide their their input and they'll come up with a more refined concise um proposal for May which is what our our budget will be based on the assumptions that come out of May um the bad news is is that we aren't getting any extra money there will be no one-time big cash infusions there won't be hardly any Cola um they are projecting that our our Cola is going to be less than 1% at this point um and this is coming off of years of very very healthy generous colas so it's there's going to be some impact because of that this is just a comparison of you it really illustrates the discrepancy between what the governor says is happening and what the legislative analyst offic says is happening there is a huge gap between and then what was actually enacted there's a huge gap in between those so again it's still very early um the tax deadline is right around the corner they'll have more refined numbers and a more refined Outlook um after April 15 this is just the historical trend of prop 98 over the last 10 years um and it really does show that even though we've had a few rough years it's still trending up meaning our our revenues are still going up over time it's following the um the S&P for capital gains as you may or may not know California is very dependent on sales tax personal income tax and very um very dependent on capital gains taxes so the stock market stock market does well we do well if it doesn't do well we don't do well but overall it is trending Upward at a really consistent pace which is good for everybody the cola um this is a last 40 years of the colas that um have been enacted in our budgets um one important thing to note is you see it going up and down up and down anything over a six% is an anomaly those were especially good years you know the governor was fing generous um but overall we're right where we probably should be it's starting to renormalize we're not going to see these 678 plus colas for a while it's starting to taper down and get back to where it should be where it has been historically good good news is what he's not proposing is Cuts Like I said cuts to any prop prop 98 funding at this time he's also not proposing any deferrals meaning that we delaying giving us cash put putting it off to another year more months which causes us to have to borrow money to meet our obligations to pay our bills um which costs the district more money to do that so that's not in the proposal at all and he's also not proposing to sweep anything that we've already had or that he's already promised us and hasn't given us yet um and if you remember last year that did happen with some one-time grants that he gave us they did sweep some of it back after they'd given us the cash they took some of it back luckily we were we were able to weather that just fine it had no effect on anything um but he's not proposing that this at this time again everything could change again in May depending on tax receipts that come in this is just um I just wanted to highlight that these are our base grants per Ada but with the 76 Cola that they're proposing it only equates to $75 between $75 and $91 more next year over this year so it's it's it's insignificant just something to keep in mind the colas um at our at the first interim presentation the assumption that we used was almost a 4% Cola for next year so our numbers were based on that second interim we've had to reduce it by down to the0 76 almost a little over 3% um so that's just that's just a picture of how it fluctuate it can fluctuate from month to month really um they're projecting the 2526 and the 26 27 year um from what they had already they had projected at budget adoption back in June of 2023 slight adjustments nothing really signific ific just slight adjustments downward and again these can absolutely change again in may they can change again in June and they can change again next year so is this is always a moving Target um what does this mean for Apple Valley this is just a real rough what um our estimates are at this time about our lcff funding um we're projecting 14 and a half thousand per Ada um the one good thing that is kind of balancing things out for us is our Ada has improved pretty significantly significantly this year and when we got our P1 numbers that was able to offset the reduction in lcf do the cola dropping so far from first interm to now so fingers crossed it holds and we're we'll be all right um Cola of all of these little special grants they are applying Cola to some categorical programs we only get three of those we get the Child Nutrition mandate block grant special ed um the rest of them don't really apply to us but they are applying that uh 76% Cola to those programs It's never enough anyway so even if they gave us 10% it still wouldn't be enough to cover those programs but that's okay um these are the the projections that I'll be using for this SEC well at second interim and for the next four out years including budget for next year um planning factors that we use to determine how much money we're going to get how much things are going to cost us like pers and stirs as you can see is especially perss is consistently Going Up Stir seems to be pretty steady but perss goes up every year and by 2728 we'll be paying 30 cents for every dollar we pay an employee to purse so that is a significant jump It's a significant expense to the district um so we we have to plan for that as well this was just to illustrate the pace um at which minimum wage has been going up over over the last couple years and in the future um it's currently at $16 an hour and it is scheduled to increase every January one for the next five six years by 40 to 50 cents an hour so that is also something that we have to keep in the back of our minds to make sure that we as a district keep up with the pace of minimum wage local Reserve caps the 10% cap that we're allowed to have in our Reserve still stands um yeah hasn't changed we still have to cap it yeah um so what happens now they're like I said they're negotiating with the the legislator and the governor they're having meetings they're they're saying you know whatever they do and negotiating um what they're going to spend for next year and on what they're going to spend so um we're kind of in a just in a wait and see um right now for the next couple months until um the May revise comes out in the middle of May and that's what be was Wasing our 20 24 25 Budget on is whatever those numbers that's it thank you any questions any questions you're gonna see some of this again yeah in my slides for our second inter financials thank you I do hold on sorry oh you have a question yes I do sure um one of the things that came up in January and I'm just wondering if it still stands um with the 76 Cola they said that that usually the state tries to avoid that at all costs and they usually will try to bump that up to 2% especially in election years do you think that still stands or do we just still have to wait until May we still have to wait until May that's when they will do an adjustment um sometimes you'll as you get closer to when they release it you'll hear some chatter about it but as of right now they usually don't give us an official answer until May we are of the opinion and listening to some other experts that we get advice from other than School Services they seem to think it's going to be one maybe 1.1 1.2 when everything's said and done but as of right now it's 76 yeah I wrote down also I think 1.27 I don't remember why that number came up but I have that written down too yeah that was one of the previous estimates of the statutory Cola remember this 76 is the statutory Cola and it's calculated using some variables which don't necessarily reflect California's economic condition but they represent the United States economic condition and there's still another couple variables that have to come in before the official statutory Cola is calculated however the legislature and the governor have the ability to not fund that which they've done in the past so you know even though the statutory Cola may come in at one or 1.1 uh we are worst case scenario the the funded colon may be zero okay thank you certainly thank you Cindy um moving on I'll just go through our second interim report for this particular year again these are um what this is the second of the two interim reports again this is a snapshot of our district financials as of January 31st and again as Mariana said this is one of those legal requirements report due to the county by the 15th um so positive certification again qualified you'll see the history across the state of districts in financial um um well not doing so good financially either qualified or C or negative you see those numbers have gone down we will be certifying positive that's part of our report in the consent agenda later on okay now you won't move now let's try that so as as Cindy mentioned we had some Cola assumptions at budget adoption and first interim I wanted to put the comparisons up here you could so you could see our current year Cola was 8.22 that of course didn't change even though the significant decline in property or I'm sorry personal income tax revenue and corporate tax revenue at the state level they didn't adjust the cola down going backwards but they did adjust going forward again as Cindy mentioned the statutory at 76 and 2.73 in the oute again this is for the current budget cycle which is current year and the next two um up to June of 2026 so in 2024 assumptions as we build our multi-year projection and what we have to do we have our lcff calculator that we use the funded Ada of 1290 12597 which is actually for next year we're assuming that that will be funded at this year's Ada level um our col at 76% lcff Revenue increase comes to about million um and that's offset by expenditure increases um step and column for our team members um utilities cost more um everything we buy is costing more um the on the Federal in the state revenue you'll see the adjustments that's all based on some of that Sesser onetime money that's all expired June of 2024 so we're assuming none of that will exist in 2425 in the budget our projected expenditures for next year year again all negotiated settlement step in column you'll see the stir and Pur employer contribution rates and again I mentioned removing all the onetime covid relief funding and and we assume it's all expensed um 2526 again we go to a Ada of 12665 which slight growth in enrollment and a continued slight growth in our Ada yield percentage with that 2.73% col of that does Net us a lcff revenue increase of 6.9 million in unrestricted revenues and you'll see in the multi-year projection how that works out as we move through the budget cycle on the expenditure side there are no negotiated settlements effective in the 25 26 school year so we have not in included any costs pertaining to that we do have step and column the stirs and purs we are assuming some operational efficiencies and I'm going to keep that term broad at this point operational efficiencies can mean anything from trying to spend less on electricity spending Less on water um looking at the programs and what we're doing throughout our district and making sure our programs using data are working and we're spending the money in all the right places so if we look at the multi-year projections this is the unrestricted side of our budget which is primarily our lcff revenue and expenses related to the lcff so you'll see our our revenues up there on the top line uh expenditures you'll see the excess deficiency line unfortunately we do have a deficit spend in the current year of about 8 million 2425 were projected about 7 and a half and then 2526 about 3.2 so I'm just going to say this we're getting closer to balanced but we're not balanced um that's our goal is to make that excess deficiency is zero um spend this year's money on this year's kids so you'll see the effect on the unrestricted ending fund balance we're down to 8.1 million in June of 2026 based on the assumptions we have in place today uh that does meet our minimum 3% required Reserve however um that does not meet our board policy of a 5% required Reserve so sometime as we're working on our next budget we will have to uh take that into consideration and perhaps even Institute more operational efficiencies to arrive at that current board policy for our unrestricted U Reserve this is the restricted side of the budget you'll see an incredibly large L deficit spend this year and that has a lot to do with spending all that one-time money because there is no revenue for that we got that money last year the year before and the year before so we're expensing it now out of the fund balance uh on appropriate programs supported by those one-time funds and you'll see we normalize our Revenue over 2425 and 2526 that is very um characteristic of prepandemic um restricted Revenue numbers uh our title programs Federal programs some of our state categorical programs and the current assumption is that we will spend that down to zero so in the combined numbers I'm sorry we'll spend that down to 100,000 so in the combined numbers our ending fund Balan is primarily an unrestricted ending fund balance you see all the way over to the right and all the way down you see that 8.27 one million and again that does meet our 3% um so just really quick you'll notice um on the revenue line we'll see we're 248 659 this year and 230 again that's normalized none of the onetime monies is still there none of those restricted programs and you'll see that 230 million to bed a quick look at the components of the ending fund balance again I reference our 3% required Reserve down there 7.2 million in June of 2026 and we're at 8.2 uh so we do meet that again as I mentioned we however we do not meet the 5% board policy required Reserve so highlights great thing is our enrollment prepandemic March of 2020 just before the pandemic we were 13247 and the most recent enrollment report we were 13650 so we're about 400 students higher than we were pre pandemic that is not the trend across the state of California uh the trend across the state of California is is larger declines um and students um have left the state of California moved out of the urban centers a lot of districts experiencing decline across the state our Ada our attendance ratio is typically 94 95 uh post pandemic um com coming out last year we were in the high 80s this year we're almost 92% which is a significant significant increase as Cindy mentioned earlier really helps offset some of that decline in um the cola for next year again local programmatic decisions as we move through the budget cycle May Revis this coming next that'll give us some more information and I know some representatives from Auda and CA have been invited to um view the May Revis which is actually going to be a webinar this this may it will will not be live which is easier for more people to get involved than watch and of course we we will look out for the adopted budget when that comes um in June and what kind of adjustments we'll have to make when we come back in the fall any questions on the second interim that I can address thank you kie do we have any public comments we do okay Susan CGR great good evening superintendent Nelson board members cabinet and audience my name is Susan cin and I'm the Auda special ed chair I come to you tonight to give an update on issues we're having in special education in our district the past school year we started using the safe for students who have an IEP things have been very difficult and frustrating as of today we still have many teachers missing students on their case load and in sa as well as students still una airmed which means if you work on their IEP it gets erased many teachers have reached out to Student Services regarding the unaffirmed and missing students with no response at the end of September we received a very fast two-hour training from Priscilla Avala at the time of the training we could still not access sa finally in November the first IEPs were able to be written using sa in December we received two lengthy emails from Priscilla numerous special education teachers reached out to me regarding the emails and the confusion that we had over them I emailed Priscilla to see if another training on St could be planned Priscilla wrote me back and said good idea in January we received more emails regarding sa and I emailed Priscilla again regarding trading I never received a reply in the beginning of February Karen Sabers two speech therapists and myself met with David wheer Priscilla and Dustin Conrad to go over speech language case loads sa and cod I thought the meeting went very well however again we heard nothing back regarding training dates I emailed David and Priscilla again for updates about training as well as issues with large case loads 10 days later this past Monday I received a response back with st training dates one was Saturday the other was Saturday before Easter April and April 17th a Wednesday I told David that Saturdays would be difficult for our members as was given less than a week's notice and the other is the day before Easter I truly believe if Sela was contacted earlier in the year when requested we would have had more than two days notice for training and more would have been available during working hours or during the work week an IEP is a legal Federal document usually between 20 and 40 pages you would think that your teachers and support providers would want to be properly trained um to fill out the information unfortunately it doesn't seem to be a priority the other issue are large case loads we have several RSP teachers with case loads larger than the Ed code limit of 28 students one currently has 36 and one soon to be 34 several have 30 our speech therapists also have been dealing with large case Lords with an average of 70 when we met with Dave and Priscilla they did offer to have the slippers those are the speech assistants to be able to work additional hours to help out Unfortunately they can provide assistance but not with all the paperwork required for IEPs we need to continue to work on getting these case loads down Auda has and is willing to work with the district to figure out solutions to these problems we're hoping we can have a better and timely communication as well as follow through with student services to come up with a plan to solve these problems to end on a good note next Thursday March 14th at gret Hills High School is our field day for our students with moderate to severe disabilities each student is matched up with a regular student for day of fun activities hope you can make it lastly on April 10th at Apple Valley High School we'll be holding our special ed dance for our moderate to severe students for both granite and Apple Valley High School I hope you can come out and see these amazing students they made an invitation that I have for all of you guys to be able to come as well thank you thank you very much key card superintendent comments nothing um Mrs VI comment no I'm good Mr Ry nothing further Mr Raley I have a comment I would like to um be sure that the superintendent looks into these allegations that are coming from the uh special education since we are serving kids to be sure that this is not an issue that is real or made up and and at least get back to us so that we know what is really going on all right discussion action session it is recommended that the Board of Trustees discuss and take action on the following items we have to mutually agree on no more than six candidates for the 2024 C California school boards Association delegate assembly for sub region 16b the um the candidates are as follows Heather all good Helendale School District Amanda Buchanan Apple Valley School District Tom Courtney lucern Valley USD Barbara du Victor Valley USD Cindy Gardner uh rim of the world Clayton Moore Victor Elementary School District and Scott Wyatt San Bernardino City USD I will need a motion to um to uh vote for six people on this um list so we have to move it to open it right yeah um I'd like to recommend Cindy Garder like to recommend Amanda I'd like to recommend uh Bor do Tom Courtney Tom Courtney Heather Al okay we have our six oh we have Clayton Moore so we'll need um make a motion we approve those six and I'll second all in favor I I so we are now approving Heather all good Amanda Buchanan Tom Courtney Barbara du Cindy Gardner Clayton MO approve the updated Apple Valley Unified School District governance handbook I need a motion we need a motion first and then discuss motion second and then disc motion second and then discuss ition approve second I'll second it okay any discussion uh I have a question on the section in the governor's handbook regarding orientation members it says that the um the new language the proposed language says that newly elected members may not participate in board activities business or professional development until they have been seated following the oath of office uh just have a a question on that uh newly elected board members um have been chosen by the the will of the People by the voters and it seems that that um newly elected board members would benefit from uh as much training as they could get um I think it's it's helpful to the effectiveness of the board and the effectiveness of the and students would be impacted in a positive way for incoming board members to be trained as well as they possibly could for them toh get as much training as as is possible to hit the ground running as it were to not be playing catchup um in this position in terms of overseeing this many students with a budget of this size I think it would be uh beneficial for incoming board members who are new to this position to get as much training as possible uh so that they can be as effective as possible from day one when they immediately take office um to not allow incoming board members to get professional development which would enhance their infected I think limits them and limits their effectiveness and and students would be affected by that so I I disagree with that statement there I think incoming board members should get as much possible training as they can be so that they can be as effective as possible as soon as possible how does it read now it reads newly elected members may not participate in board activities business or professional development until they have been seated following the oath of office and again my my question my concern is these incoming board members have been selected by the will of the people right I think what what what it means because we we had that discussion I don't believe you were at that meeting but the reasoning behind it is because we discuss confidential information such as close session with expulsions Personnel issues and such that uh until you're officially sworn in uh and certified by the um ROV that you cannot sit in am I correct on those that was the um the conversation because uh uh the people may have voted for the board board member to become a board member but until that vote has been certified by the um register of Voters um that person is really not yet a board member it doesn't say it doesn't say so that's that's the language I would like to I hear what you're saying and it makes some sense because I think um we we had a challenge year years ago where we had um an outgoing board member and the incoming board member both going to the same training but we don't really need the outgoing to go to the training exactly the outgoing needs to step away so that the incoming can go um and so now we had that thing in the middle um that I that we thought um that it would be best for whoever is going to be the trustee we wait for the uh register of Voters to uh give us the okay that says this person was certified is good to go you don't have to be sworn in you know so that's not what the language says okay I understand so I think what we need to do uh if it is okay with the rest of the board is to pass it back to the uh superintendent to give us a different language and perhaps we can put it in a different box uh and put put in a different location uh instead of putting it in the handbook so that whoever is incoming will understand this is it becomes more like administrative RS or something instead of being into the uh board handbook so I I understand what you're saying that one's not talking about closed sessions it's not it's not it's talking about professional development it's it's the orientation portion um as and what I'm understanding is um it originally said immediately following the selection of a new member members will be seated following the oath of office and then the new section now says newly elected members may not participate in board activities business or professional development until they have been seated following the oath of office um that's TR that the the the part of it of that they would not participate in close session or actually be seated at the dis is one part this professional development piece which um really ties back to the annual education conference through um California school boards Association um you do have a board bylaw 9240 where it discuss um board training I think if if you want to delineate how um new members even once it's certified even if they haven't taken the out of office would be able to attend that California school boards association meeting I think that it could lie there in a board U the board bylaw very specifically so if you um are okay with that maybe um if if we can either bring the the governance handbook back next month or we can um ask you can you can approve it with the orientation of new members blue section remove the the part that was added and then I can bring back the board bylaw with some suggestions on how to deal with um newly elected versus outgoing and very specifically about that California school boards asso this issue brings up the corollary issue which you mentioned in that if a board member is not reelected why are we spending taxpayer money to send them to training when they're going to be out of office in a matter of days it seems like a waste of money and and that that ties in with this issue but yet is not explained and spelled out in this so I think there needs to be some my suggestion will be to uh take that out and turn it over to the superintendent uh to put it in the right spot where it belongs and bring it back to us in the next board board meet with those points clarify with that points clarified and one other thing that I'm just thinking of too and I know we're going to pull it so it doesn't really matter but just that I did not think about when we were discussing this previously but the way it is worded right now it almost makes it sound like with the workshop that you held for all the candidates it would almost exactly go against that as well exactly the the blue sentence is contradictory with the sentence right after you know where you provided information just on the The District in general you know what I mean I do it wasn't there no it wasn't if we did add that we almost would not be able to do that for anybody who threw their hat in the ring in future and that's why you do a workshop and you talk and I didn't think of that at all and I sat in that meeting I I don't have the excuse of not being there because I was there now that I'm listening I think as a board um if somebody wants to be a board member if somebody wants to serve on the board I think it will be a good practice to uh give them an overview of what this district is about uh and give them uh information so that they they can go in with their eyes wide open to say okay I'm going in here this is what you are required to do it is not there's no violation of of um confidential information right there exactly you know you are just getting all of the information that book is out there anybody can pick up my handbook and and use it everybody can get a hold of it just to see what a board member does because it's always interesting to think that you can do the job of a board member until you get into the seat and then when you get into the seat you see all of the rules that are in place that makes it hard for you to do all of the things you've been promising every body on the street so it is important for that person to have a good understanding coming in to um actually tell themselves uh when I go in here I'm not serving myself I'll be serving a group of people teachers children families I will be doing that but that training is important unfortunately it's not a whole week's worth of training but it's important for whoever wants to come in to be able to get it right um to get the knowledge but when you spend um I don't know how much it is to send people to the aec uh for one person um you know we need to really button that down so that we can save uh the TA the taxpayer money and not send people who are really not going to service the district um to go so that was one of those one-time thing and I I don't think it will happen again because that's why we're trying to button it down now so that the next aec election time is coming um whoever Because by the time um the election finishes the the application of the paperwork for the aec has already been submitted a name has been put in we've already paid for it so the person is thinking they're going to go but if they didn't win their name is still on the list so we need to be able to find a way to say okay if your name is on the list and you didn't uh succeed in that election whoever took over from you they will have to be a transition to change your name change your name for that that person to go to the a it's a placeholder it's a placeholder and and I have board bylaw um 90240 open right now um and it does cover the orientation as well so I think it would nicely fit here to very much delineate at election time um as long as it's certified that's the only issue because we've had a year where it was quite close and it wasn't certified yet and we waited and waited until to get results last but we can be very specific and so I'll bring that back if that's okay um and maybe get it to you ahead of time with just some information to see if it if it aligns and then we can bring it as a board item for the April 4th board meeting April 4th board meeting okay Miz it yeah we were talking about earlier that's why I was okay then do we would just need if you want to bring the governance handbook um take it from draft to um back to the governance handbook you could just amend it with that line um removed if that would serve the board if not we can bring it back um at the April board meeting as well amended I think most of what's on the um governance s book is good uh if we just pull that section and bring it back just the line do that line so you can approve it as a with the amendment with that line moved yes I think I made the motion so why don't uh amend the motion to remove that paragraph paragraph yeah you good with that Gary one sentence okay one sentence yeah we I still need we need a second on that I'll second it okay all in all in favor I I I any opposed okay approval of successor contract between apple Valle IFI district school district and California School Employees Association chapter number 828 period of agreement July 1st 2023 through June 30 2026 I need a motion so moved second any discussion all in favor I I approve the certificated and classified Personnel actions as listed so move I'll seconded any discussion all in favor I I any opposed approve the recommendation for requested leaves as noted I a motion I'll move it on second any discussion all in favor I I I approve the recommendation of the administrative hearing chairperson effective immediately on expulsion case number 12 2023 to 2024 I'll move item uh 12 I'll second any discussion all in favor I I exposion number 13 I'll move that item as well any discuss second any discussion all in favor I I expostion case number 14 2023 to 2024 I need a motion any discussion all in favor I approve the amended agendum a to the contract with California professional management for the TK classroom building project at Desert NSE Elementary Sandia Academy and yakala Elementary I need a motion so moved I'll second it any discussion all in favor I consider the financing options for the construction of the Grana Hills High School stadium and transitional kindergarten classroom located at Desert North Elementary Sandia Academy and yakala Elementary and provide direction to staff for securing financing for the aformentioned projects before we do that I think somebody is ready to get started do we need to make a motion so you can open it for discussion so mov I okay he made the motion and second any um all in favor no no no disc we can't approve it yet we got to discuss any discussion yes I have some discussion gentl and a presentation and I'm sorry I didn't mention earlier my presentations were clipped together you should have four copies Cindy's mine and then this one and and the next one for the next item um I'm going to talk a little bit about uh facilities constru construction and certificates of participation as a financing tool if you recall over the last couple of years we've talked two projects mainly related to cop financing the first is our transitional kindergarten uh it's a full implementation in school year 2526 which translates to uh um I don't know what our enrollment transl slates to because it's been really interesting um in theory there'd be a thousand TK kids eligible in the fall of 25 the state of California estimates only about 60% of eligible transitional Kinders are showing up our numbers are even less than that um but we still do need classrooms throughout our district to serve these students when they do show up so the project design status we actually um I think on the board agenda tonight you're ratifying a contract with Silver Creek modular Incorporated for the construction of these buildings they were low bidder um each building has two class rooms I believe I shared that with you a couple meetings ago or last meeting um site plans the architect and the engineering is in process uh we've had Consultants out doing soils tests uh toppo studies to get grades for path of travel all those wonderful things so this this next slide is a estimated project budget based on where we are right now for our TK classrooms I it's broken down into three main categories the modular buildings and site work and site work means everything to get the site ready for the buildings that's uh excavation compaction um foundations sidewalks um new playgrounds shade structures over playgrounds um all the things that will make those areas great for our new TK students uh our general conditions and construction management is uh just that the general conditions is a lot of the items that go along with the construction one of the most visible components of General conditions is all the fencing that goes and the fencing doesn't cost $1.7 million but it's a component of those General conditions the CM California Professional Management they manage every aspect of this project and coordinate for us uh as a district um and you just did approve the amendment to their contract on this particular project soft costs contingencies and escalation um that is everything that doesn't fall into those first two categories that's architect fees engineering fees inspection fees uh soils test geotechnical testing uh contingencies anytime we enter into a Construction contract with a contractor we build in a contract allowance for instance I'll go back to our HVAC project with f um I'm sorry yes FMS Franklin mechanical systems in phase two it was approximately an 8.2 million contract we had a several hundred, allowance as part of that just in case things come up guess what things do come up when you're ripping old air conditioners off of buildings putting new ones on we had additive change orders allowance change orders deductive change orders as we go through the process so that's what those contingencies are for uh CPM is recommending an escalation as Believe It or Not things are costing more inflation is still going up so there's that built in so we are estimating at this point for these three campuses two buildings on each campus in each building contains two classrooms so it's a total of 12 classrooms four classrooms on each campus we're estimating a potential total budget of about $16.5 million on to the next project that we've talked about in the concept of financing using cops our Stadium Athletic Complex over at Granite Hills High School some components that have been designed to this point uh within the stadium is a synthetic turf field with lighting uh all- weather surface track seating for about 4,500 people 3,000 on the home 1500 on the visitor a Fieldhouse which can is locker rooms a training room uh restrooms for the athletes um let's see what else U referee room a visitor's locker room uh which doubles as a wait room facility snack bar and restroom facilities uh again at the entrance I think in the um uh the uh illustrations you saw the entrance Pavilion that's been part of that design it contains restrooms to service both the visitor side and the home side separately to keep separation of the spectators at the contests small snack bars on either side of course appropriate parking and traffic areas to navigate around the facility and get into the facility and some small ancillary facilities for maintenance and operations and unfortunately I'm going to tell you right now this next slide is going to kind of sting a little bit it's expensive to build athletic stadiums much much more expensive than we anticipated when we initially embarked on this project um this is an estimate with conceptual designs and Mike Woods at CPN M who's our construction manager he's the principal of that company will say this estimate is going to be a little bit High because we are still only in conceptual but they are using industry standards when it comes to Synthetic Turf square feet allweather tracks Southern bleacher company makes they install the grand stands at every High School stadium in the United States so their pricing is pretty known musco lighting is a very well-known company their pricing is fairly steady the question is when it comes to some of the parking the concrete the asphalt the flat work those prices are fluctuating quite a bit right now but you can see for site workk in buildings they're currently estimating about 27.6 million that was our initial budget for this whole project going into this project was about 25 to$ 27 million for construction and soft cost cost and contingencies and general conditions in construction management so you can see how costs have inflated this so based on this conceptual design our cm is pegging this at about a $46 million project over at Granite Hills High School now the $63 million question how do we pay for these we've talked about all these different mechanisms the first of which is some local funding sources that we do have some resources we have fund 40 which is um our Special Reserve fund for Capital outlay we have approximately $5 million in fund 40 which includes the remaining proceeds from a cop we issued back in 2020 uh we have fund 25 for developer fees with those two accounts together we have approximately $1 million at the ready for projects somewhat like these um the developer fees do come with restrictions developer fees would be very appropriate for transitional kindergarten classrooms however not very appropriate for an Athletic Facility so cop certificates of participation it is again its non-voter approved debt it's issued at the discretion of the board we borrow against a known Revenue stream and we borrow against a revenue stream of Redevelopment Revenue again that's a proper property tax increment in certain Redevelopment areas um and even though those RDA agencies were dissolved several years ago we still get this pass through Revenue until about I think 2053 um and again cops are used for Capital Improvement projects so an option we have is to issue a new cop I'll borrow against the remainder of that Revenue stream because in our 202 20 cop we did not borrow against the entire RDA Revenue Stream So that 2020 is supported entirely through that stream with some excess which has been deposited into fund 40 which I mentioned earlier a scenario to consider if the board wishes to borrow against the remaining RDA Revenue stream without any impact on the unrestricted General fund we can borrow about $177 million that is an estimate from our financial adviser uh Piper Sandler you'll see I just made some notes there the 2020 cop Debt Service through that RDA Revenue stream goes to the year 2050 school year 4950 and a 2024 cop would go to the year 20153 that just seems so far away 30-year Debt Service um but again no impact to the general fund another scenario again numbers prepared by our financial adviser and these are projections based on current market interest rates cost of borrowing those types of things we could borrow about 30 million um we'll use the remaining Rd Revenue stream and we will impact the unrestricted general fund in this scenario to the tune of almost $900,000 a year for the next 30 Years one more scenario to consider borrow 40 million again you notice I haven't got to 63 million yet um but borrowing 40 million again uh uses the remainder of the RDA Revenue stream impacts the general fund to the tune of about $1.6 million a year for 30 years so this is the point where I'm going to ask the board from for some Direction but I'm going to make a recommendation um we have some options the first option is to issue a cop for 17 million no impact to the general fund the process to obtain the funding takes about four months and if we borrow 17 million we would be able to without breaking into our local fund sources our fund 40 in our developers fees we would be able to complete the transitional kindergarten project at the three schools identified with that scenario the other scenario is to issue a cop impacting the general fund um to build our TK classrooms for our new required grade level and to build portions uh phase the construction of a stadium um that's an option the the one on the bottom there I I think that that's that's actually my recommendation at this point this is a lot of information this is a very brief presentation um I would recommend at this point that we take a step back um gather the board in a workshop um invite our financial advisor invite our construction manager and invite our architect to talk about different ways to accomplish what we need to accomplish in our short-term facility needs including the kindergarten classrooms the TK classrooms and and our Stadium at Granite Hills High School I know that was a lot um if anybody has any questions I think that's my next slide um I'll be happy to answer if I can um if I may um know we've been at this for five and a half hours tonight and you hit us with this this is you know 9:30 at night and we're looking at all these numbers and these options and things I think I wouldn't be opposed to tabling it or doing a workshop on this so we can make some rational decisions where we're all kind of awake absolutely yeah so that' be my recommendation and and I would recommend when we do address it to involve some of our consultants in that process I think that's probably the best idea plus we are missing one of our board members correct absolutely table I think we need to table it so that we will have a clear mind to be able to make the decision when the time comes and at least we invite other stakeholders to be to participate in the process understand so we will ask Kylie to get with the board for a potential workshop dates um most likely after spring break at this point obviously okay perfect sometime in April yeah Matt I I just have a quick question certainly um on the beginning on the TK enrollment you said the cali California estimates 60% of eligible eligible TK students actually Ro that's what the California Department of Education estimated um prior to the implementation of transitional kindergarden or at the early stages of the implementation process and you said here in our district are are what we're seeing so far is substantially below that we are below 60% of eligible you know about what that percent you know Mr RC I don't have that number in my head but I will go back and look look at our projection versus our actual enrolled and I will share that information thank you so Kylie do we need a motion to table that item about cop yes so we um are going to need a motion to um we have considered the financing options for the construction of the Granite Hills High School stadium and transitional kindergarten classrooms located at Desert nulls Elementary Sandia Academy and the eala elementary and you have provided direction to table this at this time regarding securing financing for the AFF aformentioned projects and we will hold a board Workshop um to bring this item back forward I'll make that motion and I'll second it all in favor I I received information and update on a potential General obligation Bond on the November 2024 ballot and provide direction to staff I need a motion you have a presentation on that one Matt yes he's full of presentations tonight I I just need a motion so moved a second any discussion yes I do have some discussion thank you again you have a copy of this presentation in front of you and I apologize bringing some more fairly heavy information uh this late at night um we have talked I'm I'm calling this one the $200 million question merely because in our draft facility master plan our consultant with working with our architect has identified initially identified right around $200 million in projects uh to improve our schools for our students here in Apple Valley Unified so the qu the big question here is how do you pay for current student program and facility needs and future program and facility needs for our students in Apple Valley some of you may recall some of you may not recall back in February of 22 we talked about all these programs again tonight we're focusing on the general obligation Bond the board um the five board members as of April 14 2022 I know two of the current board members were not present at that meeting approved a resolution that resolution did authorize the investigation of the feasibility of a Geo Bond it authorized District staff mainly myself to retain the services of the appropriate Consultants with which we have a Financial Consultant Piper Sandler uh Tim cardi has been our longtime consultant he retired December 31st but his partner JY Kim who has worked on many of our financing over the years as our consultant at this point uh legal experts that's typically Bond counsel we use David Kasa for our cops and our previous uh issuances of debt a facility needs assessment master plan we had Eric Hall and Associates um working with them to complete that process um and then the board that resolution altho also authorized going out and finding a public opinion research consultant and a communication consultant and just to make it clear to everyone that resolution did not authorize an actual Geo bond election it was only to investigate the feasibility so really a go Bond again is require is a considered voter approved debt um it is 55% to to pass it levies an ADV valorum tax on all property on all Property Owners within the School District boundary not the town of Apple Valley boundary but the Apple Valley Unified School District boundary the maximum ta tax rate is 60 per 100,000 of assessed value and it does require an oversight committee again and it's it's facility improvements new construction uh and you can also use a general obligation bond to discharge existing cop debt so that is an option um when dealing with cop debt that impacts general fund um there's some ingredients to a bond really quick total bond amount it's typically sized to meet project needs um again and I that's why I called this the $200 million question at the beginning um but there are some constraints we have a statutory bonding capacity and that is a percentage of our assessed valuation within our district our bonding capacity right now is estimated at about $200 million um that bonding capacity generates that projected tax rate and you can see there's a couple different philosophies you either go for it all so you have all the money up front and you use it over years so you don't have to go back to the taxpayers or you you Pace it you you only get what you need maybe in five years you go for another Geo Bond that's a very common practice across the state of California districts you'll see some districts go for geo bonds every five well every four to six years because you can only do it in the evene elections the ingredients phasing and timing of the bond draws again this is really how quickly do you get the money once the voters approve it you'll see right there on the bottom typically um you'll see over a 10-year period you'll draw the bonds in every three years so you can't do everything at once um if we had $200 million worth of projects to do we'd probably work on the first 50 million then the next 50 million and space that over time um projected tax rate again you really match your tax rate to the polling results that's where that polling consultant comes in to get the pulse of the community and what they might support how much they might support again AB 195 requires that tax rate information to be explicitly clear in the ballot question that the voters would see on their ballot so there's there's no question about how much um the the the tax levy would be the length of bond bonds are typically 30-year repayments you may remember uh measure s um Apple Valley Unified passed that in 2004 um 30 years would take that to 2034 we have actually done some Bond refinancing over the years that term was shortened and I believe we current that the current term of that bond is till 2028 so we just have a few more years on that particular Bond um shorter term bonds sometimes for equipment needs um five to 10 year bond programs um typically not the best use of bond funds there's other financing mechanisms for equipment that has a short lifespan Geo bonds are primarily designed for facil of Capital Improvements long lifespan items and again the assessed value of the district really impacts the amount we can get um and that's based on um not market value of our homes and property and Apple Valley but assessed value so again just to remind the board they did approve the resolution so really what I'm looking for is a affirmation from our current board to continue this process you'll not notice in the board agenda the next two items in the discussion action section are for a polling consultant agreement and a communication specialist agreement those will be general fund expenditures we cannot use facility funds to pay these Consultants at this point speaking of the one the master plan we I've addressed that before uh the public opinion research and Survey would start right away and would really go until July um doing surveys Gathering that data and then bringing that data to the board to make a decision whether to go for a go Bond or not project priorities Bond size support of the community and I mentioned concurrent Bond programs because you can actually run two distinct Bonds on the same ballot and Each Bond is considered separate so you have the ability to access the full tax rate on both bonds it's an interesting concept not very common in California some District have have done that in recent years and I think that's something that would be appropriate for us to at least explore through our polling process and again a communication consultant they help us spread the word at the beginning part of any bond campaign uh throughout the polling process and educating the community as to what our needs are the district can share all kinds of factual information with our community and our voters once the board takes action on the resolution to call for the election the district has to step back we cannot campaign we cannot use any District funds to campaign the communication consultant contract would then end with the district and then roll over to a local political action committee to assist in the campaign funded not by District funds so again the last step in the process August 9th is the deadline for any call for an election for November 2024 our board meeting is on is on August 8th um all the Consultants I have spoke to during this process recommend not waiting that long as a board in fact the recommendations really were to hold a workshop in June where the board would have the ability to review all of the survey data the communications the the pulse of the community and then uh Consultants recommended a July meeting middle to end of July to actually consider the resolution that would be drafted by our bond Council and that resolution it can be a very long resolution I've seen nine-page I've seen 15 page resolutions related to these Geo bonds that talk about the different kinds of projects um and again with a five member board a minimum of four affirmative votes on that resolution would be required um and again we're targeting November 2024 so again um affirming I would just I would recommend to the board to reaffirm to continue with this process um specifically to move forward with a polling consultant and a communications consultant um that would be my recommendation of course the board at this point understanding um could also discontinue this process um if we're not interested in pursuing it um or anything else you'd like to do what's the cost on the consultant um I believe the polling consultant is just shy of $30,000 and the communications consultant is on a monthly retainer of $88,000 a month and how's that paid again that will be paid through uh general fund monies we cannot use facility monies at this point to pay for those Consultants thank you certainly so my recommendation would be to reaffirm continuing with this process to at least explore the feasibility any discussion any other discussion I'm finished Miss Oar unless anybody has some questions I can uh I can address I just it's just that we just have too much come coming at us at the same on the same day and so um I'm a bit um it's just a lot coming up at the same time so hopefully um the next time we have a board meeting we can spread these things out so that we're not all on the same same board meeting U because now our brains are going with all kinds of agenda items that is coming and we can't um I cannot make an informed decision because that's just too much information at the same time so I don't know what um I think we need to um either vote on it or or table it for when we are more clearheaded on what is what is required here I I wouldn't be opposed [Music] to a survey done of the community just to know yay or nay hey do we want to move forward with this I mean bonds are very hard to pass people are taxed to death in this country they're taxed to death on property taxes so you know the odds of it getting 55% in my opinion in Apple Valley we've seen how difficult bonds have been in the past some have been successful some have not but I mean at least give it a shot to see uh where we're at you I mean we've been discussing this for a while um then we can make a decision based upon I I don't think we need to hire a public relations but we could at least start with you know the doing the polling a If This Were to be on the ballot would you support it and if it's an overwhelmingly no then we just drop it at that point well that that would be certainly one option Mr Raley I would caution with uh typically in a bond process you will see the pollster and the communication consultant work hand inand um during the polling process um that's typical um um it's not the only way it can be done but um my recommendation that's fine I mean if that's if that's what the recommendation is but yeah I think that if we're going to move forward we need to make a decision like you said by August for sure or July we are in somewhat of a time crunch when it comes to pulling the community particular plan on making a decision by June um that way we can have more information and the we have to make the decision sooner than that though like we would have to make the decision to send the consultant and the communication consultant out now so that they can bring us their results back like in June so we can review the data and make that decision in July so it goes forward for August okay make is that correct yes yes U the the recommendation I would have is to move forward with the consultant both the polling consultant the communication consult and begin that process as soon as possible gathered the board together in June to review the survey data that we've collected um so we'll get the info by June so if we want yeah if we want to have that info we would have to move forward tonight y yeah well in that case we should just make a decision to have uh the Consultants begin the process so that we can tell the Consultants that we need need the information by June that's the plan that's yeah see see would be you've got three items here they're all separate but they are Matt just presented on all of them right so yeah okay so um so all we've opened so far is nine right yeah and nine includes providing Direction so in your guys's um motion and prior to voting um the direction will need to State whether we are moving forward or whether we are stopping at this point so I can have that officially in there I think we need to move forward um that's that's where my mind is going we need to move forward and then actually and that authorize the all we're doing is authorizing a polling to see if if we're gonna move forward we've just opened the motion to move forward is all we've done so far is that Maria yeah yeah okay who's seconding I'll second all in favor I I okay review and approve I'm on number 10 yep review and approve the general obligation bond for consultant agreement I need a motion so move I second any discussion okay we go ahead like we planned on the other one we vote um I need to vote all in favor any opposed review and approve number 11 review and approve the general obligation Bond communication strategies consultant agreement um I make a motion second any discussion okay all in favor I any opposed thank you wel thank you Jay it is recommended that the Board of Trustees consider approving a number of agenda items as a con consent list consent items are routine in nature and can be enacted in one motion without further discussion this procedure conserves meeting time for a full discussion of significant significant issues consent items can be approved in one Motion 1 through 41 I'd like to discuss a couple I I need a motion I would like to pull pull a couple items which numbers I would like to pull and hopefully I get them all 11 12 14 15 and 18 yeah any other person no I don't other people okay um I need a motion to approve item one to 1 to 16117 and 19 to 41 I approve items second all in favor okay um all right let's discuss yours okay actually I wrot them all Circle them too you didn't pull 13 is that correct no I did pull 13 we didn't yeah so we want to add 13 to yeah just for fun all right discussion okay so for 11 12 14 15 and 18 I just wanted it to be transparent for the public that um these are all related to speech and language therapist or um services but we are not hiring every single one of these we're not ratifying every single one of these we are just approving them so that if the district is able to um fill we have these ready to go and we can ratify them as they come available so that we don't miss out on hiring quality staff um but that we are not hiring necessarily all five of these positions so it doesn't look like we are spending a ton of tax dollars our goal always is not to have a ratification on here if we don't have to so in order not to ratify we put them on and we won't lose out we have every time we have to wait to come to a board meeting to bring one forward we we have lost several that way so right we've opened with multiple companies um and that way um if we can hire one or two get the best yep you go I just wanted to be clear absolutely and then on 13 that was just accidentally got it that's got caught up in the net with my other ones so okay that was it okay now I need a motion to approve items 11 12 14 15 no 13 throw 13 in there too because it got pulled with the other ones we put it back we did put it back did we not put it back I think we did put it back so items 11 11 12 14 15 and 18 I need a motion to approve so Mo second all in favor I thank you uh consent I we need to we don't need to go to close session um but if nothing to report we don't have anything to report out any future any future items do any members of the board have any future items not you I just want the item on the special issue to be brought back to us does it need to be to the Border just um as a report back how would you like it um I can send it earlier through um email to you if you report back to us it was brought up in public so the public would probably want to hear it too it's fine there being no further business to come before the Board of Trustees is recommended that the meeting be adjourned I need a motion so moved all in F SEC who second I'll second it all in favor I I thank you the die hards out there

to 2: p.m. subsequently all collected donations will be delivered and participants will have the opportunity to tour the shelter um Key Club and CA are set to host their Garden State equality workshop on identities and intersectionality on Wednesday March 20th at 700 p.m. via Zoom this Workshop is open to community so and it is also free of charge um the mechanical must things were finalist and they won their Innovation and control award last weekend at the New England first robotics event in Connecticut they competed against 36 high schools from Connecticut Rhode Island Massachusetts and New Hampshire our Clifton mock trial team is also doing very well they had a successful Pate County tournament beating pcti in the championship round in advance to the regional competition the team won their trial to the semi-final Regional competition and they were going back to New Jersey Law Center on March 12 to compete against the Park Ridge for Northern the Northern Regional Champions two members of the team have been accepted to the most prestigious M trial tournament in the United States Jenna and Veronica David will be representing the Clifton High School Mustangs to compete for one title of gladiator um our national social studies Honor Society has also raised an impressive $300 to date that will be used to purchase citizenships materials for anyone in the community who maybe need in need of resources um our academic kathon te won the super quiz at the New Jersey state championships they also qualified as a contestant in the National Finals where they will they will be competing n um virtually and our CHS Muslim Student Association would like to wish all who partake a very blessed Ramadan the MSA will be hosting an ifar where students can break their fast together on March 14th um at 6:00 p.m.

on the on campus that open house will focus on the proposed plans for tucon campus the second open house will be on Phoenix campus and that one is March 22nd also from 3: to 6:00 p.m.

fresh pancakes stop by fresh syrup because you came last year didn't you yeah that's why I'll have you'll be there we'll have a chair ready for you yeah so um our wonderful fifth grade teachers have been doing some amazing things in their classrooms uh with their stem units and so we have four kiddos that want to come show off one of the projects that they worked on so you guys come on and they they are going to introduce themselves good evening thank you so much for allowing us to come show off some of our most recent work my name is Riley roor and this is Kennedy erle Gracin Raby and MADD son we are here tonight to talk to you about our cocoa Express project let's get started we have two we had two objectives for this we chose to raise and donate money and donate our proceeds to Riley Children's Health to help pay for new toys or health care for sick children we also wanted to gain real world experiences in Math Science Social Studies and language arts these are the parts of the project we will talk about toight as you can see we have six areas to highlight they are brainstorming storefronts design location cost collaborative group roles content in real in real world skills covered as well as our conclusion in other words did we meet our objectives throughout our brainstorming session we made many decisions we decided on the name for our shop which ended up being the Coco express our logo is a mug to represent our project which is hot coco we considered a few different organizations But ultimately decided we wanted to help children children therefore donating to Riley Children's Health became an easy decision throughout this project we we had many tasks and a large variety of goals to fill we wanted to make sure that our location and hours were accessible for all of our customers it was important to set a fair price for both the company and our customers we created our store fonds to show our customers all of the important information that would help them decide whether or not they wanted to visit our shop along with important information such as our company name and logo our product and the cost as well as where we would donate our proceeds we also wanted to be sure that it was visually appealing to help attract customers we chose the library the school's library as our location for a few few reasons first there are plenty of tables for customer customers to sit and enjoy their cocoa secondly there's an accessible small kitchen so that we had access to water and finally it is an easy location for any any grade level to get to each cup of cocoa is priced at a dollar this amount was chosen for two reasons one it would cover all overhead costs which means the which is the cost of ingredients and materials as well as as net profit which means there would be two it is an affordable price for all of our for set up and planning we have three different rules for each group the team captain makes sure that each member of the group is fulfilling their rules appropriately as well as makes any final tiebreaking decisions the materials manager is responsible for Gathering and putting away all supplies needed as well as making sure they are used appropriately by other members of the group each group had two head Architects head Architects are responsible for writing and drawing whenever is needed for shop employment rules we had for to fill the cashier is responsible for taking money and giving correct change when needed Baristas make the cocoa for the customers the servers take orders and deliver drinks to the younger customers finally the buzzers clean up after customers in order to keep the library clean and our customers happy throughout this project we were exposed to several content areas the social studies we had though opportunity to engage in discussions about social issues and Community for language arts we practice reading skills by reading informational texts as we were gathered information for our projects objectives we practice our speaking and listening skills when communicating ideas and participating in group discussions finally we practiced our writing skills by applying them to descriptive posters math was used while calculating prices and terming overhead costs we covered science by putting stem Concepts into our planning and execution and as you can see we covered many technical employ employability skills as listed on the screen consider this project a great success both object objectives by gaining real world experiences and by raising money for for Riley Children's Health thank you so much for letting us share it with you terrific so you raised over $300 yeah good smile about that thank you for sharing with us today can I get a group picture with your sign do you mind putting the sign in front of you and then I can get a picture yep and then stand around the sign guys we love when people come visit us okay ready one two got thank you thank you CIO we have one ability it won't take no you're fine hi so I'm Miss T or miss tunget it kind of depends on whatever move the kids are in I'm going to talk to you a little bit about the high ability today so some of the completed projects that we have brought up since the last meeting so we started out with the can food drive and that was a great success um we moved into designing the World Trade Centers making a cal box that represented States and doing a book study where they came up with new games so since then we have actually um done a Challenger Center and this was really cool so the kids actually Ed their engineering skills and they were able to um Locate a ground sloth fossil they tracked a sea lion whose name was Edwin I learned that today um and they helped deliver supplies to stranded people this was all in a simulated environment um so their latest project they had to build a bridge um we'll see that on the next slide so they built a bridge and it had to be 6 in High by 12 in Long 3 in wide and it had to hold up to a pound so all those kids they all did a great job in that now we are currently working on our second book project where they are making a model of their favorite Steam from the book so their Ridge project this is um Alana and Jason they are in fifth grade so their Ridge was 6 in high 18 in long and 11 in wide and it held two of my big hand sanitizers bottle so that's about 2 pounds so this thing is Hefty so I asked them today what was some of your favorite things about being in high ability so one six3 said I love doing all the fun projects we get to take part in and it really made being part of high ability fun Emma our other six raer said High ability is exciting because because it gives me a chance to collaborate with new students um Jace in fifth grade said being in high ability is great because it allows me to explore new ideas outside of the normal classroom learning environment Alana from fifth grade said I like being in high ability because it gives me a chance to be creative that's one my favorite things really to say Bella in fourth grade said being in high ability gives me a chance to read fun books and do cool projects with my friends Rebecca says being in high ability gives me opportunities to explore new projects and Beckham in third grade he said I really like being able to learn new things and making projects so I'm sure there will be a couple more projects to do before the end of the year but as for high ability at CIO it is running great and beautifully thank you and then I want to introduce Alana she is one of the creators of the Bridge Project here that you have in front of you so I didn't want to go without recognizing her for all of her wonderful efforts um and helping prepare everything for for the presentation tonight can we we should get a picture what made you think to use the bottles how do you get that idea um they just looked like it would make the bridge stronger and it's really creative I like it thank you for sharing with us thank you we appreciate you allowing us to come and show off all well some of the wonderful things that we're doing at cpio and we're super excited to get the opportunity to come back and and in the future and show some more of our secrets that we have in our building so thank you guys so very much thank you and thank you parents for being your students tonight we really appreciate that thank you thank you everyone for coming and giving your presentation we'll move on to the next item on the agenda and that's old business and under programs uh Nikki yes asking for approval to add prek programming to Brush Creek Elementary for school year that's for 2425 we can responsibly do that um based on the amount of uh dollars coming in per student Fally with vouchers so we'd like to add that program for br students so asking for approv do I have a motion motion from Chelsea do I have a second second P any discussion all those in favor six Z okay and the next agenda is new business Neil so um Neola has some policy updates we are on to a new volume now so these are uh policies first reading if you have any questions please reach out and let me know I would mention all of these policies are based on new state laws so these just update our policies to match what's in the laws at the state okay and we'll move on to the next one and um under this we are going to uh permission to post summer school positions yeah yeah sorry I'm just no what up they both want to do it yeah I'm excited my bad I'm just requesting the approval to post high school summer school staff to allow for students needing credits for graduations to get additional opportunity um we've had four teachers in one PA last year as well do I hear a motion Mary ly made the motion any second second second second by Travis any discussion okay and now we'll vote 60 okay next is the elementary school and this is just an inform um just like I shared in the work session tonight possibility of having third grade uh summer school for uh I um we will share this again next time as an inform once we see I results testing starts started this week um we will know Staffing need at that time um and they'll bring more information request um approval to the first ail meeting thank you thank you okay and the next item on the agenda next next up asking for approval um for our high ability e position that we have currently we have increased need with El students both coming into us at a level one and the number of students so asking to shift that position to be full-time for El needs um English language learners for the 2425 school year okay do I hear a motion so mov app makes the motion do I hear a second second second by Mary Lynn any discussion okay all those in favor six out and then the prek t uh asking for approval of the prek teacher Pace scale that we uh discussed earlier and it's in your packet so okay um Travis made the motion do I have a second Chelsea makes second any discussion all those in favor 60 uh next item is permission to post a three three positions yes asking approval to post uh three pre- teacher positions one at nve Brush Creek and S Creek okay do I have a motion motion by Chelsea do I hear a second second second by Mary Len any discussion all those in favor okay 60 we'll move on down to recommendations um first please asking for approval for career increment Master teacher stiens for the school years 20242 through the school year of 2028 29 for the following individuals Valerie guard Angie Sloan Teresa Taylor and Karen Tucker do I hear a motion Move Motion by Pat do I hear a second second second by Travis any discussion all those in favor 6 so and next I'm next asking for approval for Timothy Jason Burton to be approved as the Jennings Kenny High School mtss teacher for the 2425 25 school year motion okay motion by Earl do I here a second second by Chelsea any discussion okay all those in favor six0 um next up also asking approval for Timothy J Jason Burton to be approved as the Jennings County High School head football coach and that would be for the 2425 season okay do I hear a motion Travis second second by Earl any discussion all those in favor 60 I have one more and asking for approval for Timothy Jason Burton to be approved as Jennings County High School head football coach with a $3,000 stien for the 24 Spring season do I have a motion so Move Motion by Pat do I hear a second second second by Mary Lynn any discussion all those in favor six0 and I believe Jason is9 I was say we've heard that name a few times congratulations you want to introduce this to who you brought with you it's my wife Hannah nice to meet you just like to say thank you to you guys for the opportunity at the school board and uh at the superintendent's office leadership for the opportunity to come come in to be the head football coach here also like to thank Dustin and Cory at the high school for the process we went through to get the job hired my wife and I are really looking forward to building relationships here in JS County and I look forward to building the program everybody can be proud of both on and off the field Jason we have a uh ritual here that you have to follow it's called walk the plane you got a follow welcome back congratulations so what are you going to run out of how much you got split backs cross oh yeah that be good we can have a whole longer meeting on all of that welcome yeah yes all right thank you for doing that okay next on the agenda next up asking for approval for Le matern to be hired as a Jennings County High School head varsity volleyball coach okay do I have a motion motion motion by Earl do I hear a second second second by Pat any discussion okay all those in favor six of and Miss she's not new to us but I feel like she would like toate the same [Applause] congratulations good luck congratulations congratul congratulations all right we'll move on to the next under support staff under support staff I'm asking permission please to post one Jennings County High School summer school PA proposition should I continue or need to be stopped there listed is separate so separate okay thank you do I have a motion Chelsea made the motion do I hear a second second second by Pat any discussion all those in favor 60 all right next please asking for approval for prek Paro and classified staff pay scale to be approved okay do I hear a motion Pat makes the motion do I hear a second second second by Mary Lyn any discussion okay all those in favor 60 asking for approval for permission to post three prek per propositions okay do I hear a motion motion by Chelsea do I hear a second second second by Travis any discussion all those in favor six out okay and then under recommendations asking for approve appr that for Jelena Belding to be hired as the juns County High School assistant track and field coach Deborah Johnson to be hired as the nor I'm sorry to make the move from norer and Elementary treasure to the administrative assistant to the superintendent and the Board of Trustees asking for Paulo Lashley to be able to be moved from Southeast I'm sorry from cpio Elementary second shift custodian position to S Creek Elementary head custodian asking approval for Rina Murphy to be um employed as the Jennings County School Corporation floating Bess asking approval for Hunter AI to be employed as a San Creek Elementary second shift custodian asking approval for Stacy Tempest to be uh employed as a Jennings County Middle School dance team coach asking approval for kindall wowy to be um allowed as a Jennings County High School volunteer assistant softball coach and also asking for approval for Philip Hatton Jennings County School Corporation bus drivers termination motion okay B makes a motion do I hear a second second second by Travis any discussion all those in favor six0 I do believe we have one in the crowd that was in that group I I recognized his face so are you Administrative Assistant yes [Music] [Applause] [Music] Johnson I got on to her for hiring her [Laughter] daughter congratulations be nice [Music] having next on the agenda is finances yes I'm asking for approval for the following donations Jes County Community Foundation $125 Grant to Mr Bowman first grade at at Hayden for an egg Hatchery project Mark and Sher laery to in the memory of Tori Sanders hook $50 to the nbe sports program Capital Industries $420 to the James County High School black cat racing North fernon Main Street $500 to the high school National Honor Society induction supplies and J's Church of Christ $300 to the high school Panther Pantry okay do I hear a motion move Pat made the motion do I hear a second second by Mary Lyn any discussion all those in favor 60 okay next up since there's five weeks between this meeting and the next our normal resolution authorizing the treasur deputy treasur of James County Schools to make payments of claims without board prior action prior to the April 11 2024 meeting to allow the treasur or Deputy treasur to make transfers of Appropriations between education Debt Service and operation funds in order to balance major classifications okay do I hear a motion motion by Travis do I hear a second second by Chelsea any discussion all those in favor 6 so I don't see anything else on the agenda so I will take a motion for adjournment Move Motion by P do I have a second second second by Mary Lyn all those in favor six up thanks guys

2% um yes and um the rest are either no or some students are worried that they would snitch but um that's all we have for today thank you for your time and we're also here and support the teachers as well thank you so much is uh did we find Maya Maya yes uh love B I want to say bab it's B there's similar topics for not pronouncing your name correctly go ahead and introduce yourself um hello and good evening my name is Maya laab and this is my partner manoda sorry my name is Maya laab and this is my partner manoda and we are soon to be graduates from Cypress high school and as we approach another graduation we wanted to bring to your attention how upset students are regarding the elimination of graduation sashes and courts I wanted to take the opinion of those of you in the audience would you be which one stands out more this pen or these sashes and courts s [Applause] and high school graduation is the first real milestone in a student educational journey and it is probably the first ceremony they are attending and celebrating which should be celebrated in a proper manner Sasha and cords have been a tradition in graduation since the 14th century taking away these traditional accessories really takes away the rewarding and special experience of graduation the district took away this tradition without contacting any students or parents of this change pins do not emphasize the accomplishments of students many students take AP and honors classes as well as attending clubs and achieving many more accomplishments to be able to display their hard work for their loved ones instead of the cords and sashes they receive pin that are disappointingly small and do not show off the dedication of the students we understand that not everybody can afford the cords and sashes but it is not fair for those who earn them and can afford them my partner and I created a survey for staff and students to take and we were able to reach almost 400 people so why this change why now we seniors object and would like to return to having the option of sessions and chords in our graduation thank you right so what I am told is that there's about a 50-second delay so I'd like to get uh the students up kind of standing in line from the from the other room can I have Gabriela ail Aila Andrew Campuzano and Miguel Calderon Miguel Calderon Andrew kusano Gabriela Aila or Aila welcome thank you good evening parents community members Board of Trustees and my fellow peers my name is Gabi Aila a current senior at Anaheim high school as we move forward to have our voices heard us students stand in agreement to advocate for the return of the sashes sashes are a reaffirm affirmation of our values our traditions and our identity it is a decaration to the world that we refuse to be defined by anything less than our hard work that we demand recognition for our achievements and that we will not settle for anything less than greatness if we want to see student rates in attendance involvement academics increase let them see that their work is valued and worthy of something better than a pin if action if action is not taken a rapid decrease in student participation in academics will happen we call upon the district to bring this time honored this time honored tradition so we may wear it proudly as we step out into the world ready to conquer new challenges and seize New Opportunities it Bears witness to the late nights spent looking over textbooks the early mornings and late evenings dedicated to extracurricular Pursuits and a myriad of sacrifices made in pursuit of Excellence it is a reminder that our individual accomplishments are intertwined with the collective tapestry of our graduating class a tapestry rich in diversity resilience and unwavering resolve based on previous events history highlights the fact that an educational institution is only as effective as the people on the school will permit that is why we stand here representing every student in the auhsd district demanding change thank [Applause] [Music] [Applause] you Andrew let's go Andrew Miguel oh good parents community members Board of Trustees and my fellow peers my name is Andrew kusano I am a current city of Anaheim commissioner and I am a student recognition and teacher Advocate a few months ago I was up before this dis advocating for student recognitions achievements work and sashes I am proud of the work that we have done the endorsements we have received and I still urge the board to reconsider this decision I am here in support not only of our sashes and stalls but of our ahsd teachers and say that I strongly oppose the RFS and I stand with our ahsd teachers and urge you to please reconsider this this action it has come to my attention that some of the people working in this very office have fallen astray from the schools and their interests I have not met a single student who has demonstrated an interest in pins various programs are still Distributing and receiving these sashes because we refuse to end this tradition and it has honored us and rewarded us for our work I want to commend the students at catella for their work and defend their rights to walk out and protest of these proceedings in support of my teachers I have this to say having been in this boardroom various times and always looking at these various CTE Pathways that are posted up around these walls they are shown off well those programs would not be possible without the dedication and commitment our teachers have to our school communities the cab seal of excellence and our dual Language Academy painted at Anaheim High School very quickly once again would not be possible without our [Applause] teachers Additionally the countless coaches and mentors across our schools that are constantly bringing championships and victories I want to thank you what we need to do instead of getting rid of these teachers is to expand various programs that are already in our schools a possible option is creating more CVA courses and expanding AP classes and other classes additionally we can stop the accept to spending on digital platforms one of my teachers put it MinGa and E Cadence are not a necessity we can use free digital platforms like Google classroom and spending instead of spending this money ladies and Gentlemen please refra and then being removed as a teacher just to be laid off what if we were to remove more seats on this board or in this office I don't think you guys would like that we need to fight for our teachers please help us thank you everyone ladies and gentlemen I appreciate your enthusiasm but they're on a time so let's try not to interrupt their speaks okay U Miguel Calderone okay uh Pearl [Applause] T and up next Halen win that's all right we'll wait for you let me know when it starts okay like this I'm G test this hello okay there were many messages I've seen around the schools from students parents and teachers about this issue this was one of the many that stuck out to me I feel like they aren't giving teachers enough of a chance especially the younger teachers teachers have and teachers have and are giving us a chance to flourish why are we not giving them this chance teachers have given us a chance in various ways through teacher recommendations contribution to events meetings sports clubs counseling mentoring and much more they are creating what I call the domino effect with enough energy they will touch our lives and move us forward one at a time one at a time these teachers have set aside individualized attention towards us I had a history teacher and if it weren't for her I would have learned the simple yet effective way of learning through flashcards and effective questioning my English teacher has taught me ways to express myself and if it weren't for her I wouldn't be able to speak up about this issue our teachers have given us a chance do you all remember when you were all students these teachers have helped us build up to where you are today do you remember what a teacher has done for you or encourage you to serve in our district don't forget where you came from what encourage you to serve in our district don't forget where you came from how would your teacher feel that an educational environment like ours is doing this to our teachers you were all students like just like us how would you feel if one of your favorite teachers were to be laid off how different would your path be I don't get why we are laying off teachers I do understand that it has something to do with the decrease in attendance and the loss in funds and the budget but if you think about it would laying off teachers be good in this situation people come to school to learn and and if we lay off teachers there there would not only be a loss in subjects but clubs Sports organizations Etc we wouldn't have the necessary resources different indid individuals to learn and some may think well why should I enroll if they don't have something for me they wouldn't enroll and they would already have more loss of funds for the current teachers if you push teachers away the Domino will fall backward in education we should be moving forward students wouldn't be able to achieve their go ahead keep going wouldn't be able to achieve their goals without teachers recommendation this includes scholarships scholarships jobs and programs that further our development even exist with without a club adviser Sports another Spa another space that demonstrates teamwork and the importance of Improvement teachers have opened our eyes to unlimited opportunities we cannot be unlimited to you if you limit us haly win and up next Dian [Applause] win good evening Board of Trustees parents and students my name is Haley nen a junior at Oxford Academy students have come out here today because we are upset with the lack of compassion extended towards our teachers in this massive layoff we understand that the district is facing declining enrollment and attendance we understand that considering those statistics the budget has to be dialed in but we don't understand why this has to come off the backs of teachers alone the district emphasizes the five C's yet students feel that this decision to lay off over a hundred teachers while leaving all other sectors untouched shows no compassion La of transparency regarding skipping criteria and layoff Logistics shows no communication at Oxford Academy seven teachers were notified that they could lose their job if every one of those teachers were let go that's half of the English Department gone 25% of the math 25% of the social sciences Department gone at Cyprus 23 teachers received a layoff note noce this layoff threatens the community the schools these are senior teachers that have had experience for years in these schools who know the culture who understand the environment and to swap them out so easily as the most convenient solution hurts students and hurts schools we are not asking for no teachers to be laid off we are concerned that ahs's solution to reeling in the budget affects teachers alone with no other consider with no consideration to other areas in the budget that we could proportionally cut instead we ask for a compromise be it retirement incentives or or cutting back programs and materials rather than cutting back Pro rather than cutting back over a 100 of a with impactful Educators and we we emphasize that you must preserve as many teachers livelihoods as possible preserving the ones that serve the students more than anyone else thank [Applause] Youk you up next after die is Ashley 10 hello everyone first I just want to say thank you to everyone who showed up today to show support to our teachers I also want to thank the district admins and the Board of Trustees for letting us voice our concerns about the matter we want you to understand that teachers go be and beyond the call of duty every day for all students here's a collection of firsthand experiences to help you see how important it is to keep as many a teacher in our district as possible an alumni from catella my English teacher offered to pay my Chromebook fee after it got taken away in my car being repoed so that I could graduate my econ teacher sponsored me in a talent show and was like a father figure to me my math teacher made sure I always fed I was always fed and was so so kind my Spanish teacher got me out of debt and paid for my AP exam Al alumni from Anaheim in 2013 I was on the verge of wanting to commit suicide it was in January around the same time a teacher had passed away in the same break my stepmom passed away and my biological dad became abusive again my biot teer at the time did not know I was going through all of that and took the time out of her day to talk to me before she started the class because of her and the conversation I sought to see a therapist and finally gained the courage to speak up about the s in the physical abuse I was going through I have never told her that because of her I am where I am today and I haven't had a chance to thank her because she made an impact in my life I am proud I am a proud product of the ahsd and I am currently working at Dale Junior High while I am in the middle of working on my teaching credential program at Cy Long Beach I hope to one day be as good as teacher like my biot teer who genuinely showed that she cares about all of her students I have to have the privilege of having so many amazing teacher through education and because of all of them I want to be a teacher from Oxford my teacher has been great in helping advise the black student union on our campus and really keeping this club alive because of a small black population at my school the club has had a difficult time occurring in enough membership to remain a club during this past year where the club was reinstated our teacher has put in her own time energy and money to keep the club running through the many activities we decided to implement this year on our on our new board from Kennedy my history teacher is often sick and forced to miss school a lot however even when she's really tired and frail she still come to school to teach us she's the teacher that makes me laugh the most and her humor super relatable to us most of all she's the only teacher that I've had who was willingly to teach us real life skills to open our eyes to all the Civics and Justice in our society she prepared us for all real world and is a realest teacher I know with that I want to thank you to all the teacher that have made an impact on our students thank you for sharing the time with us in the classroom we will always be forever in debt with your compassion and to the Board of Trustees I hope you find the stories of these individuals memorable enough to save our teachers before robbing another students experience from these teachers thank you and next up Jade Juan good evening my name is Ashley Chen as someone who's been quite involved in campus to hear the teacher layoff dishearten me addressing the contract with the Anaheim secondary Teachers Association the board should promote class sizes within the best interest of the students concerned however cutting the teachers will inevitably cause an increase in the classroom sizes these large classroom sizes are not ideal to work in especially when classes can only accommodate enough seats for a certain number of students teachers will be overwhelmed and have a hard time providing enough student enough attention for each student's needs and as for the students they will be disengaged if their teacher fails to take control of the classroom's attention which will ultimately harm the students education this leads on to my question as to why the layoff is only regarding the teachers and not the faculty as a whole additionally I want to ask some further questions what are the other Alternatives that the board have come up with to reduce the budget in the past and why have those methods failed to lead that led to the layoffs we see in other districts they have yet to have a mass layoff more or less a layoff targeted only to teachers how will the board continue to allocate their budget into ensuring that the teachers are not at risk once more who will be the one benefiting at the end of the day thank you U next up lukman Muhammad oh sorry hi I'm Jade H and I'm a junior um and currently I go to Cypress high school and in my years of high school I've gone to two different ones currently attending Cypress high school and I previously went to Magnolia and at Magnolia my English teacher taught me how to embrace my identity and encouraged my writing of topics I was passionate about she prioritized my safety even outside of school and constantly made my time in her class comfortable and my history teacher at Cypress high school has made my learning more enjoyable it's made me so engaged that I look forward to learning because I've built a true connection with my teacher I've never truly left with a teacher before them in expressing that I hope it becomes clear that teachers all throughout ahsd have been a necessity to the growth of students while I do agree that something needs to change especially taking into account the decreasing enrollment rate and the decreasing attendance rate the narrowed focus on laying off our teachers will directly affect the students teachers are the building blocks of our education and knowing that cuts are not being distributed within other employment positions at ahsd is genuinely dis in learning that we might be losing the teachers that we love is devastating and the students will feel it if we are to lose the teachers that have changed so many of our lives and I know for a fact that this is a sentiment all of my fellow students here today [Applause] feel welcome good morning board superintendent matsuda and the audience my name is Lucan Muhammad and I'm senior from Oxford Academy for sever several years it has been this dist District's mission to educate students on the importance of utilizing the five C's today I hope the board may be able to practice the fifth SE compassion for both our students and teachers that contribute to fostering a healthy learning environment within aohd a group of a students have gathered here today to request that we keep our teachers I and every other student here would not have had the courage to be in front of you if it weren't for the incredible mentorship and coaching that the teachers you plan to lay off have demonstrated the mass layoffs of teachers will only hurt the student staff relationship within our school communities the maintenance of this relationship is vital for pushing students to attend it and stay in school affecting this could cause an increase in chronic absence rates and will not attract students from outside District boundaries despite us students being fairly young we've gone through enough schooling to understand a basic math equation no Educators equals no education the pro the programs and advancements in artificial intelligence that aohd offers cannot replace the unfathomable work amount of work our teachers do so our number one priority should be maintaining the security of the jobs of our teachers today I ask why our teachers why could the most essential resource to the education of the students within our district why attack the very root of the successes of our community why boast about the pride of the programs we offer and the facilities we are constructing if we can't help to keep the teachers that provide the most benefits to our students why should we bear the burden of but why should they bear the budget the burden of our budgeting problems why cut the only resources we have we have that has a personal effect on students this decision goes against several of the ideas mentioned within the aohd core values so today I ask is aohd education working for students or is it the other way around thank you let's have uh Kylie I'm going to call first name so it can be quicker Kylie Emily AIA and then Valentina welcome uh yeah thanks for having me I appreciate it uh I'm a senior from Cypress High School um great to be standing in front of you all uh I'm not going to lie to you like half of that budget talk went right over my head um but I'm not really here to listen to that I'm here because I believe that when people are in need you help them um especially when they've been there for you and and even if they haven't you should still step up to bat for people who need it um it's one of the things that the teachers at Cyprus have have taught me um because when I joined the chess club the advisor sat down with me and taught me my first opening move um he started my love for chess my old history teacher sits in his room every day with me listens to my problems and he was actually the first teacher that I confided about confided in about my my depression and it really helped me recover um I've been out of therapy for basically a year now and I'm feeling significantly better um what I'm trying to say and not so many words is that these people have always loved me have always supported me have always stuck up for me when I needed it even when I didn't know how to stand up for myself um they taught me that I'm a person who was Worthy of love and care and support and I'm just so tired of them seeing tired of seeing them being taken advantage of and beaten down by the people in their lives they do not deserve this over 100 of them being laid off that's absolutely ridiculous is this a way to to repay them for all of the the work all of the love that they've put into these students lives because I don't think so you know what I'm stepping up for them and you have a higher responsibility than me do you not 17 years old speaking at this board meeting taking time out of my day what's your excuse thank you [Music] [Applause] K welcome am I looking at Emily AIA and Valentina welcome good evening our names are AA Jabar Valentina Morales and Emily Rizzo we are seventh graders at syamore Junior High and the reason we stand in front of you today is because of a Stephanie farfan or to us miss farfan it has come to our attention that there will be teacher cuts and we are here to convince you to let us keep our amazing teacher Miss farfan is our seventh grade da math honors teacher da stands for dual Language Academy something that makes Miss F fun so special is that there has not been a single day where Miss F fan is not greeting us outside the door with the biggest smile on her face when we walked into Miss Fan's room on the first day of school she was extremely welcoming and we all knew that her class was going to be a safe and fun learning environment not only has she made learning fun and enjoyable but she has also encouraged us to try our best and push ourselves something that I really personally found special about her was that she took the time to learn my name my name is typically harder to pronounce and most teachers take a good week or so to uh learn my name but after the first day of school Miss Fon got it down which I thought was very thoughtful for her Miss vodan provides help for her class before and after school if you don't understand a certain topic She'll always do her best to make sure that you get it whether it's helping during independent class time staying after school just just so she could do a one-on-one learning session or doing it before class starts Miss fatan is always willing to open up her classroom and stay after school so so students can have a fun place to hang out and catch up on homework she truly makes all of us feel cared about whenever when her presence and in less than one year she has showed true compassion and genuine care and interest in us not just as students but as people we know that cuts are being made based off seniority but her impact and contribution to syamore Junior High School the da program and my peers ATA we're here to ask you to save her job and let her keep her spot at Sycamore Junior High School and in the Dual Language Academy it would be a shame for other students to not be able to be a part of her class and they would be missing out on all the amazing things that she has to offer um sorry um I also spoke to my dad about the tough choices that us board members have to make and I personally wish that the board and the union would have made a choice to give lower pay raises to teachers so that way you could save more teachers such as Miss F fan who are investing in us and in our future I hope that both sides will think about this next time that you have have to make such a tough decision we also brought with us a lot of letters from her students that could not make it here today but they also think that Miss Fon should keep her spot in Sycamore Junior High School thank you and I hope you have a good [Applause] night Sarah and Yara and Sophia and Emma was the first one Sarah Sarah Emma Sophia oh any yeah anyone can come up welcome good evening I want to first thank everyone here tonight for being engag and not only the teachers among us today but for taking a part in my future for the record my name is Sarah alud I am in the 10th grade I'm here to help represent my fellow classmates at Cypress High School I am a child of two first generation immigrants from Syria as a child I was never able ble to receive help for school due to our language barrier so I relied heav on everything the school provided I relied on those teachers to be passionate on what they were teaching I relied on those teachers who made a difference in my education help guide me to a path that engaged me to ask questions and learn about the world around me a which is D loves to push the resources they provide in within the district but are blinded by the fact that not all students are the same the district blindly ignores how students have the power to feel comfortable around teachers as it is a profound connection one cannot share with the counselor a student just needs to relief that a teacher sees a future in them not just 55 minutes till a class rotates and ends up leaving the student to overpow projects amongst themselves that they too can earn validation or worse believe a student isn't capable to learn like other students because they aren't smart enough I've seen many my friends spiral over a bad grade and 90% of the time it's because they didn't make an effort to check up on the student to see if they really understand but who can blame the teacher they have to try and engage 40 students in the span of five days a week over and over on an endless cycle the CTA also known as the California teacher Association has their set maximum class sizes due to the California Education Code for any board members wanting to follow along I'm referring to sections 41376 and 41378 where grade levels from kindergarten to 8th grade have set class sizes only problem is after 8th grade it is decided and deemed to the district what class sizes are acceptable for those still following along this section was made in 1964 making this code 60 years old only thing is our culum chain become more difficult our population Rises we need teachers who are here to impact our students lives make it better not cut back on teachers because it's mandated by the state a isz needs to push smaller classes and more teachers as Studies have proven it is one of the most effective ways for students to learn as as Harvard Princeton Yale you name it they've all back these studies so today I'm not asking but stating a which is D to stop the selective staff cut because it won't benefit anyone but cause a plummet and hope for for students because if our teachers can't maintain a job due to those yearly cuts that appear out of the blue then what makes our futures any more stable thank [Applause] you welcome hello my name is Emma Ortiz I'm a senior at anahim high school today I'm speaking on the issues surrounding that of teacher layoffs and sashes teacher layoffs result in higher cost for each additional teacher notified teachers already are very low funded in both their subjects and personally at each School within the ahsd district by laying off these teachers you not only take away from students education from teachers survival but also from our education within the community that many parents have fought for students to have today all the dedication these teachers have put into this district is being wasted on the matter of sashes I believe that since the district members aren't in current student position PA they cannot understand the impact they have on students by removing the sashes from schools I myself have worked so hard my entire life and as well as have teachers globally to Showcase accolades of My Success by revoking sashes and replacing them with pins as an alternative for our schools my work has gone to waste same can be said for all of the students witnessing this event today I have worked restlessly for my academics and all of that has gone to waste unless we are to enact the change students are asking for you to enact as a resident of Anaheim I would like to see Anaheim prosper and grow with the times but because of these issues discussed today I do not see that change happening anytime soon this has gotten into the breaking point for some residents leading to the major decline in population and Anaheim due to either residents moving or for other unforeseen events such as these issues today looking at all of this information side by side I can understand why res residents are looking towards other cities in California for residency I urge every single board member to enact a change students have voiced out about today if we do not change I can guarantee to this the board that they will see a decline in students attendance and academics as a whole thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak today thank you Emma Sophia or Yara Sophia or Yara is the last one who's the next person Sophia or Yara I'm doing first names I speak okay welcome hello thank you so much um let's see can I okay hello okay thank you all right um hello everyone hello board members hello audience students parents everyone that came here to listen thank you so much for this opportunity to speak I am a student at catella high school and I am also a first generation student my name is Yara Sanchez I am currently a junior I am a member of intermediate dance as well as J to see a member of various clubs too a few maybe a few days ago maybe last week we had a walk out to protest pins and and The Disappearance of sashes I saw how powerful and how United us students were under a cause and then I heard about this the teacher reduction and I knew that I would be here not only just for students but for teachers as well the school school is my second home teachers and all my friends and all the students are my second family I think I've spent more time at school than anywhere else I will not be here without my teachers I owe them so much I owe them most of what I am today the opportunities I have right now and the person that I am I owe to my teachers I thank them so much I thank all teachers here and all counselors that are listening thank you so much for all the effort you have put and all the passion you put into your work I owe so much to my teachers and I could not imagine how school would look like how my life would look like without them and if I had any if there's any reduction in staff I have a bigger class size no I could not succeed as much as I did today I think the board so much for listening I thank all of you here that are in support of teachers without teachers our schools are nothing teachers are the heart of our schools and I really hope you board members consider my words as well as the words of others that have come here to speak on behalf of them thank you so [Applause] much okay um hi my name is m I'm a sophomore iella and I want to protest for or say some words for Pence because um as well as Yara I also did um I was at the protest at say saying some words um I did see many people say that they didn't want any pins and that we have done so much so many hours so much effort we have been to sweat and tears anxiety um so much that we think that we should get some courts and be proud of what and show what we have done for many hours because school like y said is like our second home um we have literally done so much not just us but also teachers um and I think from a personal background um my parents came from another state coming over here um saying that we want the best for you and I want to show them how much I have done and show them but not just but not just by pins Accords thanks Sophia welcome good afternoon ladies and gentlemen um today I'm here to talk about the shortest of staff and teachers I am from sore junior high school and I'm here to support all of my teachers and [Applause] staff I owe a lot of thanks to all my teachers that are supporting me and I want to thank Miss L Boles and Miss wakabayashi for for being my math and science teacher they are really showing me a lot this year Miss Miss B is showing me how to do slopes and all the fractions and Miss Wabi showing me about all the dinosaur in sections and about space that helped it l um sorry if any other teachers are here from Sycamore my bad thank you everyone for the support that has been here today and thank you for your [Applause] time so I just want to say thank you so much to our students who came here we know it's not easy to get up here and speak in front of a crowd to get up on the day is um this is very uh heartfelt and emotional uh for you and we heard you and we are listening and taking notes um and uh if you ever uh you know want to sit down with any of the board members or cabinet um I understand that cabinet members have been meeting with uh students and uh we we really appreciate hearing um your words of truth and your Insight um it helps us uh be better at our jobs and uh we thank you for coming forward thank you okay moving on to reports of the associations uh Mr [Applause] Morgan so just to clarify right before you start the time five minutes right you all right so it's okay wow how about those students I haven't started yet haven't started yet getting ready getting ready all right good evening board president Randall tro Board of Trustees superintendent mana and cabinet tonight my Association reports is about the district's proposed budget reduction plan which directs the elimination of 110 teachers that's right 110 full-time teachers that's almost 10% so what does the loss of 110 teachers mean 2third of our current students will not have another class with at least one of their current teachers this is a tremendous loss to our students in response to the needs and the asks of our community our teachers have created many new and inventive course offerings added to this the districtwide move to SII model for special education it's no longer uncommon for teachers to have three four sometimes five unique class preps losing 110 teachers will only amplify that a teacher cannot effectively prepare for so many classes teachers will be unable to differentiate instructions for their students and provide Behavior or social emotional support it will severely impact the quality of our students learning conditions I have seen teachers and their students in this boardroom sharing amazing achievements standing here with their families smiling and taking pictures losing 10% of our teachers will guarantee that many of these student opportunities will disappear it will be impossible for the remaining teachers to take on these roles and above and beyond they're already overflowing plates a teacher shared a recent story with me from a student who spoke at at elcap stakeholder meeting the student shared that it takes a long time to get help because their teacher has so many students to help every day in so many different ways cutting 110 teachers will further decrease the opportunities for students to receive individualize attention from their teachers teachers realize that we're facing a significant decline in enrollment on the face of it cutting 110 teachers indicates a state of emergency when it comes to our fisical well-being is it how is it no other district is closing is close to cutting 10% of their teachers we've done our research only two Elementary districts are cutting a combined total of 23 teachers letting so many teachers go seems like we're heading off a financial cliff if this is the case why are no other employees targeted for layoffs no District administrators no side administrators counselors social workers psychologists District or site classified staff now I am not advocating to lay off these other employees but something doesn't seem right about a plan that only directs the laying off of 110 teachers who are the only employees in our districts that spend their entire work day in the classroom with students as I said before we understand declining enrollment we are projected to lose 1300 students next year definitely not good news but that law should equate to about 45 teachers not 110 last year the clear direction of elcap was to reduce class size and support staff ratios almost $12 million was spent on these reductions with 4.5 of it spent on non-teachers not a single individual from this group other than teachers have been designated for layoff the decision to cut 110 teachers flies in the face of what our community has been asking for through the lcap process the district's budget reduction plan led to a notice of reduction in force for 195 permanent status teachers think about that 195 in some cases reaching back to 20 years of service I can't even imagine what the next few months are going to be like for these teachers as they hope and pray that their layoff notice will be rescinded almost one out of five of our permanent status teachers will be trying to conduct business as usual while working under a cloud of anxiety uncertainty and fear their careers access to healthare means by which they support themselves and their families are on the line and how this layoff process was rolled out definitely does not reflect the fifth C compassion I want to finish my Association report on the topic of class size there is a belief out there that class size doesn't matter as a 24e veteran of teaching Junior High history I can tell you class size Matters the teacher sitting here in this boardroom will strongly attest to the fact that class size Matters I ask you to genuinely engage our teachers our students and their families and meaningful discussions about class size I can't imagine saying to our students in their families that their authentic lived experiences are completely based on a false premise why are you saying to our school Community I understand what you're saying but we know better I applaud our joint efforts to build community schools in Anaheim key to this transformational strategy is that we listen we see and we acknowledge the unique assets and experiences of those we strive to serve I now ask you to listen to our school Community furthermore it is unconscionable that teachers should be asked to forego a raise or even a cost of living increase to fund reasonable class [Applause] size there could be additional information or impending decisions that I'm not aware of that might mitigate the loss of 110 teachers if so I'm happy to engage in those conversations however if this is the budget reduction plan in its entirety or in its majority then I see foresee additional conversations not just with me and not just with the AA leaders in this boardroom tonight I appreciate you listening and I encourage you to heed the community's call to action in the coming months thank you [Applause] Dr sasai I like saying that Dr leai good even evening Madame President Randall tryo Board of Trustees superintendent matsuda executive cabinet students parents and school Community joining us in person and online we appreciate the opportunity to dress you today as we navigate through these challenging times together is important for us to acknowledge the concerns that we have all noted from the recent notices of reductions in forc to the fiscal responsibility we must uphold in the life of declining student enrollment despite these obstacles I stand before you with optimism and a firm belief in our ability to overcome I want to take a moment to celebrate the success of our students during the winter sports season and congratulate Western and Savannah for their CIF State runs in our Junior highs we wrapped up a wonderful season in sports and we want to encourage students to continue to participate and get involved in extracurricular activities at their home site I also want to highlight the beautiful International Day events throughout the month of February the girls engineering day cave student teacher and staff presentation and a huge shout out to our the following schools for their California distinguished School recognition Cyprus Kennedy Lexington Oxford and magoya high schools I also want to thank Our Community Partners and organizations for in for sponsoring the incredible AI Summit the summit was not only a testament to our dedication to Innovation but also a demonstration of our capacity to adapt and thrive in changing Landscapes our students teachers and staff sign shined as they shared their practices in and out of the classroom events like these remind us of our potential for growth and the endless possibilities that lie ahead as we move forward we are grateful that at the heart of our institution is a commitment to our people to our students our staff and the community we serve let's let's continue to work together hand inand keeping our focus on our mission and the better future we create for all those we serve thank you for your unwavering dedication and commitment to our institution Together We will rise above these challenges and build a better tomorrow thank you thank [Applause] you uh did any other Association wish to speak today okay Heather Heather hutner csca welcome thank you for having me um members of the board cabinet Board of Trustees um and superintendent and parents students many employees um I just want to start with saying uh we definitely sympathize with our Asa compatriots um although I have a few hundred instructional assistants that would probably um not agree that you are the only ones who spend all your time in the classroom so um but uh we would just like to say that we would like to thank and recognize all of the classified uh members under CSA and for what they do for our students and the district while we have way too many different positions for us to mention specific especially when there's this many speakers um we do want to talk about a couple in specifically um our Prof pair of professionals our specialized academic instructional assistants who help our special education students in the classroom and all of our specialized instructional assistance Behavior Support special uh special abilities adult transition medically fragile vision impaired deaf and heart appearing who not only help in classrooms but also help care for our students basic needs including feeding toileting and specialized procedures our campus safety AIDS who monitor the campuses including bathrooms Gates and are critical to both the prevention deescalation and management of violence on our campuses these are not only some of the most important roles on our campuses they are also some of the lowest paying and the hardest working we're thankful for the heart uh the increas training that the district has provided for the campus safety positions this year and we are hopeful that additional training will continue to be offered for both them and for our par Professionals for safety we also want to continue to recognize all the continued hard work of our school's office staff The Office Clerks secretaries and Senior administrative assistants despite declining enrollment the daily tasks asked of our site office staff have increased efforts for for increased parent and student engagement result in increased phone calls and office traffic while we lost our community Liaisons we kept all of their duties the district has been able to introduce many wonderful programs for students but many of those require additional purchase orders requisition forms parent phone calls interpretations scheduling Etc and those are all done by the continuing existing staff the school board policy on school clerical Personnel allotment was last updated in 1993 and it hasn't been followed in years because it's from 1993 um I know HR classified is currently doing their first ever uh study comparing Staffing levels for school office sites so we just like hope that when they complete that that the board will take that information and revise the policy so that we will have an actual consistent logical formula that that will be used to determine the number of clerical staff that are assigned to the sites I thank the board for your time we hope that everything in the future continues to go okay is there any other Association that uh wishes to speak okay um we inadvertently uh missed a student uh Haley soell would you please come up good evening to everyone here today today I am here standing on behalf of my students my fellow peers and the teachers who have brought me up and fostered my love of learning I have been a student in the ahsd and Anaheim District since I was in kindergarten in my time with ahsd anahim Union High School District I have been given so many opportunities but among them I've also been given teachers who care and have fostered my love of learning in and outside of the classroom some of the most amazing teachers I have had have taken the time to explain and go into depth about what they are teaching before and after school as well as always answering all of my questions I can't imagine not being able to go back and visit as a student I can tell each and every one of you that the teachers you have hired have always given us care and have always gone the extra mile most of these teachers are coaches in sports and are advisers in clubs if these teachers are not there yes there is a possibility that someone else could pick up that club but the probability is low because a lot of teachers already advise other clubs this directly affects all of us as students and will affect the students coming into our district my sister is in fifth grade and I can't imagine when she gets to Junior High not being able to have the teachers who poured into me so much not being able to be there to do the same for her not to mention if we have less teachers then there will be bigger classes which means that teachers will not have time to advise clubs or coach sports or stay after school when a student has a question or needs help because they will have to use all that time grading due to the large class size as a student in the global language Leadership Academy I can tell you that our teachers do the best they can and take the time to get to know their students I can't imagine if the seventh graders now who have gotten to know the teachers for Science History and Spanish and are expecting to have them the same teacher next year come back to a different person one of the reasons a lot of GL seventh graders are not worried for their eighth grade year is because because they have already established a set relationship with that teacher I say this confidently because that was me I'd like you all to look at all the students who have come here to represent their teachers and all the teachers who have come here they are the ones who make the programs possible all we ask is that you hear us out and take our opinions and how this will directly affect us into consideration thank you for your [Applause] time do we have anyone from PTA here to speak okay moving on to public comments Open Session items and I I just like to say opportunities for public comments occur at the beginning of each agenda item and at this time for items not on the agenda persons wishing to address the board trustees should complete a speaker request form um I have them here uh and sub minute each speaker is limited to the maximum of three minutes I think tonight or are we going to keep it to two no I think it's still three you still be three different topics all right um and uh board members cannot immediately respond to public comments as stated on the speaker form first up is Lee Garcia welcome Lee thank you can't see okay I'm speaking here tonight because I can no longer stay silent in 2018 my daughter and the Kennedy girls water polo team were interviewed by the police at Kennedy High School she soon became a Jane do in the criminal case against her 40-some year-old water po coach who's now serving 18 years in prison the coach was able to get into the kennedy pool wearing only a speedo where he sexually assaulted my daughter and three other students he slapped my daughter across the face and kicked her in the chest repeatedly in the kennedy pool as a way to teach her to toughen up he told her he then made her do it back to him he also sent her disturbing text messages from the kennedy pool deck how could this have possibly happened at one of our schools you all ask well I'll tell you how two years prior in 2016 another pened coach was arrested for sexually assaulting students soon after the district let the head coach and the principal go promising to hire a new water polo coach as soon as possible instead of immediately securing a new water polo coach Mr matsuda wrote a letter of recommendation for the same principal who police say failed to report sexual misconduct allegations to law enforcement or Child Protective Services as mandated by California law the principal told a detective that he was aware of allegations against the coach more than a year before the coaches arrest but did not investigate those allegations the district let the whole school year and summer go by without hiring a new water polo coach so the players had no coach and no summer program as they were promised finally in August they hired a coach but did not hire any assistant coaches so this new coach had unfettered access to players as he got in the kennedy pool to abuse them in the light of everything that has happened to these students at Kennedy High School and the failure of Mr matsuda all along the way I'm here tonight to ask this board to fire Mr matsuda do not let him just quietly retire fire him now if you can't or won't then please resign yourselves you are the very board who continued to give him raises and renew his contract even after this information of him writing the letter of recommendation came out in 2019 how do you guys sleep at night the Safety and Security of students in the Anaheim Union High School District should be your top priority fire matsuda now and give his ridiculous bloated salary to all of these teachers out [Applause] here uh next up Blanca VI Vias Ortiz Miss Ortiz Matt rapone the timer ready I can go oh I'm okay I'm m Ripon uh I'm a teacher at Anaheim High School I've been there for 24 years teaching English and I've taught AVID for 18 years alongside of that uh ever since starting my career in the year 2000 I've embraced technology in the classroom to use as a tool to assist teaching and to uh teach students on how to use that tool I'm here to talk about action item 10.14 in our agenda today where you'll be asked to approve uh the district to pay pay $450,000 to EC Cadence to experiment with an AI tool that is uh designed to be an electronic tutor uh to help students with their assignments I want to share some notes uh to help you decide to postpone that approval I want us to wait until there is uh published data on the efficiency of this type of tool I want to wait until there is published research uh U publish published information on the cost and revenue of this tool before we make a decision the action item does mention that we are going to share Revenue with EC Cadence and at Solutions Group LLC I would like to see more better projections on that I think we need to wait until there's confirmation from the auhsd teachers and by parents as well I have an email printed right here from a parent saying she is very concerned with AI leading her son in certain assignments I want us to wait until a ahsd stops paying for Google work workspace for education I say that because we should not pay into two lmss at the same time we we currently have a subscription to uh Google workspace for Education which includes Google Classroom we have just been denied access to it teachers so we pay $150,000 a year for that uh it's lower with the enroll lower enrollment it's $125,000 a year it's a lot cheaper than $450,000 a year and it would take eight years with under that cost to reach a million dollars I say that because that's a it's a long time to reach a million dollars after looking all the numbers that Nancy shared with us with all the Millions millions and millions well that's a long time to reach 1 million right and it would take 16 years to reach $2 million it's really not that much money and the tools that Google offers are non-biased and they are very effective I I request that the district pilot other lmss before leading into another contract with e Cadence we have our contract with Ekans to expire uh in January of 25 so it now now is the time to start shopping and piloting other lmss Google Classroom canvas Etc thank [Applause] you Germaine hello board hello Administration teachers students I really want to recognize the students and the teachers who are in the Next Room over because they are out here in force to support um both their sashes and also our teaching staff um my name is Jermaine num manchow I'm a parent and a Community member and a um sorry I need to speak louder uh parent Community member homeowner here in Anaheim and I he um I was looking at the agenda for this meeting today and saw quite a few M us that we're going to be signing that have to do with AI um that has to do with our research and our grants um things that are supporting our school system um but I'm really moved today by our teachers and the issues here as a homeowner and a resident when we had our facilities gentlemen talking about how great our facilities look and how that's going to keep up our enrollment in our district and I will tell you as a as a homeowner a resident Community member a parent it is not the facility that make my school it is our teachers with the reduction in class sizes or the increasing in class sizes it affects our state standards we are now at below 20% for math in the Anaheim proper schools okay so if you take out Oxford and you take out Cyprus and Kennedy we are now below 20% for math how are we going to prepare our students our kids for those future jobs the jobs in AI the jobs in science the mo on 10.15 is about commuter science uh education we need our teachers to be able to teach these kids and that's the way we're going to continue to get people like me to put my kid in Anaheim High School school district schools if we have class sizes that are too large we're just I'm not going to send my kid to a school that's so large that the class sizes are unattainable that our teachers have no way of connecting with our kids this is this is a community issue our families in Anaheim in Cyprus in bua park we are the customer of this district and we really need you guys to focus on what we need as community members as what's going to be best for our our families our communities it's these teachers please look at other ways to try to cut costs I understand it but if we continue to cut our teachers we will lose more students the the previous speaker is is ready Miss Ortiz on good evening my name is Blanca Vias Ortiz I am a parent to four children one who just graduated from catella with the $14,000 scholarship offer from cvu two of them currently attending catella a junior who just became VP for katella's ASB for the next school year 2024 2025 a freshman who made second Team all league in cross country for the varsity team and all because they had or have great teachers and mentors and I currently have an incoming seventh grader whose transfer to South Junior High was denied today today I came in person to file an appeal and instead I was told I couldn't file the appeal I repeated myself to your transfer deaths personnel and was told to instead file complaint next door I asked who I could speak to above her and was told to instead remove my two children from your current high school catella high school and make them go to anahim Anaheim High School make them leave their friends behind make them leave their relationships built with their teachers who they have learned to trust and have pushed them to their fullest potential this isn't an option not for our family what I want you to understand is the fact that as a parent I have already established a relationship or relationships with teachers at catella high school I am hoping to join katella's PTSA tomorrow during our coffee chat with the principal and this week I learned some of cella's Educators receive slips some of them being current teachers of my children and some of them being past teachers who have helped and their and their guidance and their education I was not supposed to be here tonight speaking to the board but the teacher layoff is the reason I'm here I ask that you please go back and look at the transfers that were denied I also ask that you also go back and look at the budget it's letting go of Anaheim UniFi High School District the only option you have is there nowhere else where the budget cuts can be made please don't forget that at one point in your life a teacher helped got value and your education please don't limit my child as to where she can learn the best thank you Dr 6on and then next up uh after Dr sigon Guadalupe basave thank you for your time uh I graduated high school 1997 gas was a125 and we thought that was massively too high that was a long time ago and two weeks ago I gave Miss Weaver a phone call who was that that was my high school teacher who helped change the trajectory of my life I'm sure that District had a great board and and leaders but I called none of them last week my school had a great pool and a great Marquee I did not go visit those because they shaped my life Miss Weaver shaped my life to the point where 27 years later I gave her a call what made her so great she was there she taught curriculum with a passion she opened her classroom up during lunchtime she was a club advisor she was there she helped me process college and career path when sophomore Evan had his heart broken by Lisa Nava that teacher was there 20 years from now none of these students are going to contact any of you as great as you might be at your jobs they are not going to contact AI they are going to contact their teachers unless you Rift them tomorrow here's the reality is this move would not only negatively impact current teachers that are great what message are you going to send current students who have the seed of passion of being the Next Generation teachers why in the world would they pursue teaching when they are about to witness a district cast off 110 teachers they're going to have zero confidence in education as the occupation this is a moment of time for all of you to step into the destiny that you gave an oath to to sit here Nintendo had a huge Fallout a couple years ago Wii U it was a terrible system their CEO said we're not cutting anybody me as the leader is going to take a self-imposed 50% salary reduction and then every board member self-imposed a 20% salary reduction because they said the morale of our company will be done if we cut the people who are doing the actual in the world [Applause] work thank you yeah good afternoon everyone that is here I have a daughter that is in grade eight in School South and I'm I am here to support the kids or the ones that are doing really good in school and they are just taking the recognition away from them and they are putting being put to the level like the others that are just basically doing the the same yeah I was seeing there one of the daa um meetings with Mr masura and what he mentioned that one of the reasons why uh there are low in in the graduations if because uh the residence is expensive and yeah and and it's low in the quality and also the increasing of chatter schools for so I think it should be a a Four Element and that should be that the kids should be getting incentives like uh in if you go to a chatter school they get like six medals believe me they're making a big effort and and they're not getting and you guys are taking away all these recognition [Applause] and that is why she would encourage you to reflect on this because as a parent uh she would think that if she's not given anything for graduation then she would move her child to a charter school hey David Morgan please welcome good evening first uh I want to congratulate all of the students who came and spoke today so eloquently and so [Applause] strongly in the notes that I prepared and in listening to these folks I have two children in Anaheim Union and all I'm seeing is balancing budgets on the back of a teachers and you're going to increase class sizes and create a self-fulfilling prophecy you talk about uh shrinking enrollment so you lose 10% of your teacher base it gets out in the public what students are going to want to come out here it's going to decline so you're going to continue to cut it on the backs of teachers and you have all these beautiful buildings and you have no teachers to teach in them and no students to occupy them there'll be great monuments to this board you know in closing I was going to challenge this board to look to itself to look to the money that it's the pay increases that it's received but I saw in the agenda today that uh Mr matsuda is up for a 4.5% pay increase it's on the agenda folks look it up so you mean to tell me that in the same meeting where you're going to potentially riff 110 teachers you're going to increase the superintendent pay by 4 and a half% I'm sorry you make charter schools look better every day have a magical [Applause] evening Julie zipic I probably not pronouncing this correctly zip zip I apologize hello good good evening um the original reason I came tonight was to speak for a growing group of my friends and neighbors Who currently have children enrolled in this District we wanted to voice our concerns pertaining to teacher cuts the consideration of laying off teachers directly impacts the quality of education and support our students receive since my three uh kids should be faling into this District in a few years I felt it was important to support the the parents and teachers in this dis in in this effort as I was doing my research pertaining to your decision to lay off teachers I became aware of the rapidly declining enrollment and alarming low test scores I was alarmed and saddened how significantly below average the scores in reading math and science are in this District per California dashboard Anaheim unions perform performance reaches far below average orange rating declin Five Points in ela two points in math and 2% El progress so the natural solution you thought of to combat your your declining test scores was to lay off more teachers and social justice and stay woke courses we all understand the importance of putting our students first is disheartening to see decisions being made at the district level the recent things that have been prioritize over the actual well-being and academic success of our students is unbelievable the cons the consideration of laying off teachers directly impacts the quality of education and support our students receive furthermore the current lack of supervision on campus and on and already large class sizes has led to concerning behaviors such as drug use in the bathrooms and PDA among students in the classrooms these issues are only exaggerated ated when there is insufficient support and guidance available to our students the decline in test scor indicates that the current methods may not be as effective as we hoped we should all understand the importance of putting our students first so it is disheartening to see the decisions and priorities being made at the district level to put our students first we need teachers my three kids still have a few years before they go into this district and I'm trying to be proactive by speaking tonight in hopes you PRI prioritize academics um with over a hundred teachers jobs on the line I was scanning over the the um bulletin for tonight and if you I invite you to turn to page 20 action item action item 9.30 like that last gentleman mentioned of 4.5 Rays they're asking for superintendent and um assistant super superintendent okay thank you Sparks Wendy Sparks that item was was ped oh uh prior to the board meeting that item was just pulled so I just want to let you know that item was pulled this wait mine 9 three I she was speaking about previously right okay all right good evening a few years ago I attended and spoke at a school board meeting and listened to a presentation of an interim budget report I remember hearing that the district was anticipating declining enrollment when I left that meeting I felt confident that the district had a plan for this decrease and would plan accordingly to do what was best for kids in the upcoming years I am here again to speak as a parent of a Cypress High School student athlete I am not sure you are aware but Cypress High School football coach uh Rick Feldman a former Orange County Register coach of the year who has attracted many players to Anaheim Union High School has received a riff notice I heard International students virtualy but what about Athletics has the district thought about how much of an impact Athletics can increase or decrease enrollment I know the board has to make tough choices but I ask why is it always teachers who take the biggest cuts the people who have um who we've heard who have the most daily interaction with students the one as you've heard today have had the most impact on our students I had Mo multiple Goosebump moments today listening to the student speakers they're these students are a testament to the hardworking dedicated students of ahsd these budget numbers are all projected but in the meantime teachers have to deal with these drastic Cuts how many teachers and students will Au hsd lose because of this I thought the district was trying to attract students I ask you to please consider other options we can do better than this surrounding districts are all experiencing declining enrollments but have made different choices a student in the Overflow room made a sign that says at best my teachers do all they can for me please do all you can for them thank you [Applause] all right that ended all of our uh speaker public comments moving on to items of business Educational Services 9.1 School sponsored student organizations and Daniela you get to vote with with us on this one this is an action item I need a motion move to approve second okay moved and seconded all in favor I I all right thank you resolutions 9.2 resolution number 2023 sl24 db-12 adjustments to income and expenditures general fund resolution number 2023 sl24 db-1 3 adjustments to income and expenditures various funds and the 2023-24 second interim report action item move to approve second any questions or comments roll call vote Mr O'Neal hi Miss Smith hi Miss Guerrero hi and I vote I 9.3 resolution number 2023 sl24 db-14 establish the special reserve for capital outlay projects fund number 4042 action item move to approve second move the second questions or comments on this item okay seeing none this is a roll call vote Mr O'Neal hi Miss Smith I Miss Guerrero I and I vote I 9.4 resolution number 2023 sl24 f-07 approval of notices of exemption for the Western High School site improvements project action item so moved second roll call vote uh any questions or comments on this seeing none Mr O'Neal hi Miss Smith hi Miss Guerrero hi and I vote I 9.3 resolution number 2023 sl24 df- Z8 approval of notice of exemption for the Western High School gems modern modernization project action item so move second second okay this is a roll call vote any questions or comments on this item Mr O'Neal hi Miss Smith I Miss Guerrero hi I vote I 96 resolution number 2023 24- f-09 approval of notice of exemption for the Magnolia High School Agro science Community Center project action item move to approve second moved in second in any questions or comments on this item all right uh roll call vote Mr O'Neal I miss Smith I Miss Guerrero I and I vote I item 9.7 resolution number 2023 sl24 d-19 autism awareness month so moved second okay moved and seconded um the adoption of this resolution just want to read a little a little bit about this 2023 24- e-9 for Autism Awareness Month recognizes April as Autism Awareness Month time to focus attention on those with Autism and Related pervasive developmental disorders it also provides an opportunity to inform parents Guardians and communities of the efforts of the district that the district is making to support Autism Awareness Mr O'Neal I miss Smith hi Miss Guerrero hi and I vote I 9.8 resolution number 2023 sl24 d-20 Caesar Chavez Day action item so moved second okay moved and seconded uh the adoption of this resolution honors Caesar Chavis for his many achievements and contributions to our nation it also provides an opportunity to inform parents and community that of the communities of the efforts that the district is making to support Caesar traveis day today and every day action item U Mr O'Neal hi Miss Smith hi Miss Guerrero hi and I vote I 9.9 resolution number 2023 sl24 d-21 National child abuse prision month action item second okay moved and seconded um this some background information on this National Child Abuse Prevention month is acknowledged in the United States each year during during the month of April by acknowledging the need for public education and Community Services to help prevent child abuse and neglect many groups hope to reduce the impact to Children and Families facing child abuse and this is an action item Mr O'Neal hi Miss Smith I Miss Guerrero I and I vote I 9.10 resolution number 2023 24- e-22 Arab American heritage AG month action item so moved second moved and seconded this um herit this Arab American Heritage Month celebrates the contributions of Arab Americans to the United States and celebrates this group's Heritage and culture action item Mr O'Neal I miss Smith I Miss Guerrero I and I vote I moving on to item 9.10 resolution number 2023 3/24 D- hr-3 certificated reduction en Force this is an action item so moved second moved and seconded um would the board like to uh ask any more questions or have anything else to say about this item uh I don't have questions but I do have comments okay um so I I just want to thank everyone that came out tonight um all of our public spe speakers especially our students um you know tonight's decision is not an easy one uh ahead of the board uh but we do have an obligation uh to maintain a physically responsible budget and address the economic challenges ahead of us and that did include last year um a consolidation plan of one of our schools and we are in a decline enrollment uh it's a serious and growing problem um that needs to be addressed that's over more than over 3,000 students in the years to come and um but I do also share your frustration in the process and the notifying of re reduction en force and uh we are obligated to over notify and um also follow the Cal this this is the code set by the state of California code um that mandates um that these get sent out um but I do know that we are still waiting the governor May revise um and we uh are still ahead of some of the retire upcoming retirements so um we hope it can be in a better place in the budget but right now um this is where we stand yeah and I have to dit What U Mr Guerero just said it's a difficult decision to make we've had to make these decisions before uh in the past and unfortunately we'll probably have to make some decisions like this in the future this does not come easy uh uh we appreciate the students coming forward on any subject matter to express their feelings it is uh important for us to hear what they have to say we do listen to what they have to say um and we take it to heart uh so what is being done tonight is not easy the numbers you have heard I know are going to be mitigated we are at the uh by law we have to make decisions by March 15th that's that's not our decision to make we have to do it and in order to get to where we're going we have to what we don't like to say but we have to over riff knowing full well that we will be reducing that in the future I can't guarantee where it will be but we know that it will be below where we're at now so um I reluctantly will agree when I came out tonight I spoke to Daniela and I made the comment to her that I remember America coming out of the second world war as a a grammar school kid I remember my brother serving when I was 10 years old in Korea my husband went to Vietnam and I can tell you from where I'm sitting here in front of you I don't ever remember as painless painful time as we are living through today the difficulties of running school districts is nothing like it was when I went on this board years ago and I detest this my one of the most beloved people in my entire life was my stepmother she taught kindergarten and she was an angel and I have teachers in my family and as Mr U O'Neal said we have to make these decisions but I am going to tell you I am going to do everything I can within my limited power on the school board to make sure it's as fair and Equitable as it can be and I thank people that teach in our schools the other day we had a meeting and I said the public doesn't have a wit of understanding of what you deal with in schools today it's mindboggling and I leave these meetings at times and I'm just choked so I'm going to go along with this but I want you to know I will be speaking behind and do what I can to make don't boo so um we we we're people too and we we understand that it's um an economic thing it has nothing to do with the hard work of each and every one of you we know your students love you this is as my colleague said one of the hardest things that we have to face if we do not face this we do not have a school district we can't rent a school district on negative funds what I understand and I'm I'm sorry if some of you did not get the information until tonight um we've been looking at this for several years knowing the next year this is going to be this is going to be the Year this is going to be the tough year and then we got the Esser funds and we're like yes we can save we can save it we don't have we're pushing it we're kicking the can um and this is the time and if we don't do it now and we don't really take a hard stab at what we're what we're looking at what we're facing I'm sorry you know it's really tough and we don't take this lightly cabinet doesn't take this lightly they lose sleep over this yes they do they've been answering phone calls we all have been answering phone calls and trying to explain to students because they were given partial information and I'm a little disappointed that that they aren't given the full information of really what's transpiring here because in in knowing in knowing the whole story you can understand it you may not like it but you can understand it and well what I do know is that we have been talking about it and what I do know is I don't believe any other school district has a superintendent and the assistant superintendent of Finance come out to each and every site and I don't want to debate I don't want to have a back and forth but I do know they did come out and they made themselves available this is tough this is tough for all of us and a loss of 30 three 3,500 students in just this time frame we have to be responsible and we cannot spend onetime monies on ongoing ongoing funds so we all know how you would run your home your own budgets at home and you would be fiscally responsible so we understand and we we feel you and we we this is tough so moving on moving on to the vote and this is a roll call vote Mr O'Neal very reluctantly I miss Smith sadly I Miss Guerrero reluctantly I and I as well I moving on 9.12 resolution number 2023 sl24 dbot d04 Madam president can we hold off for a moment please yes why don't we take maybe a two minute break I can speak to you out here and how much L whatever much's make that go so do they them why you guys mik oh and Marie 30 was up pulled who asked you to pull it the one in the back democracy democ Democratic process item 9.12 resolution number 2023 sl24 dbot t-04 compensation for board meeting action item so moved second okay Mr O'Neal I miss Smith I abstain Miss Guerrero I and I vote I 9.13 agreement Transportation friends of montor greenhouse school action item move second any questions or comments on this item okay seeing none all in favor I I I 9.14 contract waxi Enterprises LLC and envoice solutions company action item so moved second moved and seconded any questions or comments all in favor I 915 agreement wart Inc in I Inc all right action item so move moved uh seconded any questions or comments on this okay moving on um all in favor I I I I 9.16 home to school transportation reimbursement plan action item so moved second any questions or comments on this okay all in favor I 917 agreement the after agency action item so moved second moved and seconded all in favor I I 918 agreement Thomas Phillips action item slow moved second okay moved and seconded all in favor I 9.19 agreement Simon Silva action item slow moved second moved and seconded all in favor I had a quick question yes um I just wanted I know this is a new uh parent leadership academy that will be districtwide if I'm correct um how would that promotion work across for our parents so if approved the family and Community agent specialist along with our community school coordinators will work with our site Administration to promote this event with parents and against about two corts of 60 parents districtwide uh and they'll do it with the Simon Silva um is a part of the module this spring thank you yeah just as an FYI um I think it was six years ago when we had a parent leadership conference that was here in the leom room he was one of the keynote speakers and was really popular p so that's one of the reasons why we're bringing them back brought them back all right okay all in favor I I 912 contract independent vision therapy evaluation Dr Beth Ballinger action item slow moved second uh questions all in favor I 91 9.21 agreement well Street Psychological Group Inc DBA well Family action item so move second second okay all in favor I 9.22 memorandum of understanding Jose Mendes and Elizabeth Van Esquire PhD University of California Irvine action item so moved second can you um just give a quick little description of what this is going to do for us yes prip Miss see this is oh this is with um uh Katie chers yeah so so they're going to be doing some work with uh I think in regards to math and it's our partnership with UC Irvine so I think it's one of the things that they came to us uh because of the work that we've been doing they want to connect uh and do some work where they're doing teacher interviews or um looking at eable classroom experiences that connects to math uh so they're also going to be doing some professional learning with our teachers as a part of the research that UCI has been doing and so Katie chowers our curriculum specialist has been working closely with them and is going to be bringing this to our district and again they they received the grant you see so that's where there's no cost so it doesn't affect our budget but so they came to us yes they wanted to work with us it's really cool all right uh all in favor hi hi hi Human Resources 9.23 initial contract proposal ahsd to Mid Managers Association this is an information item 9.24 public hearing initial contract proposal ahsd to Mid Managers Association MMA and is uh does anyone wish to speak on this item scared Miss Guerrera with my okay seeing none moving on 9.25 initial contract proposal MMA to ahsd information item 9.26 public hearing initial contract proposal MMA to ahsd anyone wishing to speak okay 9.

in K3 see Miss Ibrahim one of my favorite teachers to purchase ticket okay now on to sports we would like to congratulate members on um of our bowling team for their accomplishments this season Sarah zeil uh First Team all County finished first place in the county in 33r in the state First Team all League Jamal Martinez in the honorable mention for All County and a honorable mention for all League Sam zel first place all County and First Team all league and delz razar for honorable mention honorable menchion All County and second Team all League Ryan Pierce also has um um honorable mention for All County in honorable mention for all league and for flag football we are about to start our third girls flag flag football season over 80 girls has registered to try out so please come and share them M at their first scrimmage on March 16th at 11:00 a.m.

that open house will focus on the plans for the Phoenix campus we are hoping to have the community come and take a look at our drawings pictures and ideas and we would like to get their input and then we will finalize the master facilities plan from there hopefully during the summer and then the real work begins looking for funding that wraps up my report president Kel and members of the board I truly appreciate your commitment to ASB to our students and to our work in providing the best education and supports to our students I'm happy to take any questions that you may have any questions okay moving on to information item 1.05 assistant super intendent of curriculum instructed instruction report acting assistant superintendent catch off good afternoon board president kifl members of the board superintendent rikan assistant superintendent Cooper and the asdb community I know for most of our Phoenix and employees the only thing standing between them and spring break is this board meeting and work tomorrow so I'm going to keep it pretty brief uh this is the board meeting where contracts are discussed for leaders and teachers and I'm very proud of those uh for who we are offering contracts I want to thank them for their hard work this year and hope they accept their contracts and return to the ASB team next year I also hope that staff who do not require contracts also return as I'm very proud of the work they've been doing I'm proud of our blind programs um who were able to provide the first bra challenge in person this year since Co watching how much that event meant to staff families and students was a good reminder as to why asdb does exist I'm proud of the blindness 101 course that they've created for ASB leaders and I'm looking forward to participating in the second session in April I'm also proud of our braist and their hard work ensuring that materials are accessible to our students throughout the state I'm proud of our de programs and the hard work that they've been doing and getting the slpi assessment up and running as well as their hard work going into a second year of offering different types of Def culture trainings for asdb staff I'm proud how that program supports all of our interpreters and how miraculously interpreters are always available even while being ridiculously understaffed I'm proud of our de Mentor program and the important information and perspectives they provide to our staff and our families I'm proud of our itinerant programs who continue to support districts across Arizona and I'm very proud of our three itinerant directors who have been collaborating with each other to ensure that we're providing a consistent message and services across the state I'm proud of all of our itinerate teachers who travel across the inner city traffic and our vast rural highways to provide services to deaf heart of hearing blind and low vision students in literally every part of the state I've been continuing to work with the directors and Albert from facilities to try to find the best way that we can identify a sweet spot for itinerant teacher case loads while taking in factors like travel so we can have an idea how to identify um whose case loads might be larger I'm proud of our two day schools in Phoenix and Tucson who pretty much this year have been working with all new leaders and I'm proud how they continue to adjust to support families students and teachers while also juggling ad and federal requirements is there room for them to grow as leadership teams of course I'm proud of the teaching staff on the campuses who continue to work with leaders as well as me to come up with Solutions when problems arise I appreciate their honest and often communication with me throughout the year and I hope that that continues uh with the next person who gets to fill the seat I'm proud of our sped director and her team in a very short time they've put uh IEP meeting Norms in place and based on the meetings that I've been able to sit in I'm very impressed on how they're being run I'm proud how both Nur nursing staffs on both campuses continue to address issues as they arise and I'm very proud how our related service providers have been working with HR and business services to professionally and productively address their salary schedule I'm proud of our CTE director who continues to dream big and has a vision to make the CTE program at asdb be one of the N the best in the nation I'm proud of the work of the OD they continue to build supports on our campuses and I'm looking forward to next year having instructional coaches not just at pdsd but also ASD and ASB the OD is also responsible for making sure that all of our state required testing is completed appropriately and legally and they also track all of our PD a lot happens within that group finally I'm proud of the work of our Alp program and how vast of a program that truly is that Dr Benedict overseas uh this year I have not had much time to spend with our 0o to3 folks but I know that their work's not easy and I'm proud of their continued efforts uh this year I have gotten to know the pdsd preschool pretty well and I'm very proud of that staff how they support our students with their language development in both ASL and English and I'm truly humbled by their dedication and hard work to those students so that was a little longer than I anticipated um but this is the last actually there's one more board meeting that I'll be keeping this seat warm and I wanted to make sure to thank everybody for their work through this year um I hope that many do turn next year so we can continue to build on creating something special thank you there's any questions about my report please feel free to ask any questions okay thank you moving on to um agenda item 1.06 ass assistant superintendent of agency operations and Support Services report assistant superintendent Cooper you know they're going to call him back okay we can hold for a second sure e for we have you back Mike I'm here okay now I can turn it over to you good afternoon for president kifil superintendent rikan acting assistant superintendent catch off members of the board and the ASB Community the operations and support services team is very busy supporting each of the educational programs with planning the needs for the end of the school year uh we also continue to work on completing various other projects which consist of monitoring the spend of our agency budget finalizing the transition of our new student information system creating an agency overview video and brochure aligning student counts with staffing needs and doing a deeper dive into the ca per student by disability categories and as superintendent reichan mentioned the completion of the development of a master facility plan continues to be underway we continue to be faced with having unbudgeted expenses and financial challenges as pricing increases and shortages of qualified staff continue to drive up cost and strain our hiring efforts managing the limited resources is a significant challenge as we strive to provide the best possible educational experience for our students um this requires strategic planning and priority ization to ensure that our financial resources are utilized effectively we try to make every effort to ensure that the budget is allocated to the various aspects of Education such as the instructional materials professional development and student support services having adequate qualified teachers and support staff to maintain an optimal student teacher ratio and provide the necessary services to our students is another crucial aspect of the budget in our Resource Management I think we are all aware that most schools across the country have hardly escaped the Staffing hardships that have become so prevalent shortages that predated the pandemic but deepen as exhaustion illness and disillusionment about pay and other issues took a toll on the morale across the K12 Workforce and other Dynamics in the labor market made Recruitment and Retention even more difficult it's more challenging for us because of the specialized services and instruction that are essential to the learning and success of our students specifically I feel as if I continue to repeat myself these last couple of me meetings but needless to say we're still working on filling staff vacancies by looking at various modalities to expend our Recruitment and Retention efforts and as we continue to work on year three of restructuring the compensation and salary schedules included in today's Human Resources consent agenda items our various pay schedule changes and salate increased proposals for fiscal year 2425 and as you all are aware in Prior years staff were not informed of any compensation adjustments until July we listened to those suggestions received and our commitment this past year was to ensure that all staff would be informed prior to the summer break our first priority were the teachers and that was because they are the only staff other than the leadership team that have contracts so we made efforts to bring those proposed salary schedules to the board in January since they received their contracts in March I previously indicated in my prior reports that we plan to bring all other proposed salaries schedule changes to the board in March um all of them are included in the consent agenda items today except for one which is the related Services salary schedule as most staff are aware when compensation adjustments are made they are not included in the decision making process until they have been finalized in this instance with the related services staff there were a number of questions that were being posed to us after the teaching salary schedule was approved in the January 11th board meeting our intent with the related Services SC salary schedule was to align it with the teaching salary schedule whereby the years of experience would be expanded from 20 to 25 years and a step increase would be given the proposed changes were shared with the related services staff in an information session meeting about two weeks ago um however based on their Collective feedback it was suggested that we re-evaluate the proposed changes and bring forth their scholar scheduled changes in the May 9th board meeting we are working collaboratively with the staff and will be taking into consideration the feedback received as well as reviewing salary survey information to determine our placement in the market for Recruitment and Retention of those staff I do want to point out that most if not almost all of related services staff have reached out directly to me thanking the team and I for taking the time to listen to their feedback and how it has been a great deal to them and demonstrates how working together can make a difference in the agency one staff member in particular told me that in the 24 years she's been here she's never been privy to any change in information of her prey prior to going to the board and what our original tent with having the information session was to help address those questions and concerns but also to communicate and be transparent with them I also want to briefly address comments I've been made aware about our agency finances and how it relates specifically to how Medicaid reimbursements and the prop 301 classroom site funds are being used as most of you are aware we have various funding sources most of which are appropriated or either non-appropriated when it comes to specifically to the non-appropriated Medicaid reimbursements those revenues are primarily used to offset some of our incurred costs for nursing and related services staff and for a point of clarification when I first started with the agency I shared with the superintendent and the finance committee that the Medicaid reimbursements were not being used appropriately and in fact they they were being overspent annually it took me about 3 years with the team to monitor the activity being spent from the Medicaid reimbursements and now we're able to use those funds for their intended purpose as it pertains to the non-appropriated prop 301 classroom site funds they've traditionally in the past per statute been used for needs directly associated with the classroom Prim arily for teachers with providing them the opportunity to earn additional salary each school year and their participation in professional development goals if you recall in 2021 Senate Bill 11:30 was expanded to include student Support Services as an allowable expense um which has allowed our related services and other staff indirectly supporting the classroom to also be eligible to receive those sens annually when it comes to any agency staff member having any questions or concerns about the use of our various funding sources I have stated on a number of occasions they are more than welcome to reach out directly to me or our director of business services and they're also welcome to attend our finance committee meetings I think we're all aware that our fiscal position and finances have been more transparent these last few years and in the past in conclusion as a team and I juggle our various responsibilities to assist the educational programs and work through addressing their educational priorities and student outcomes we make every effort to try to work smarter not harder by streamlining our processes optimizing our resource allocation increasing our accountability and improving our collaboration and communication efforts by facil facilitating datadriven decision making and when I took this leadership role back in 2021 my mission and goal was to continue to improve the agency's organizational culture but also to identify effective resource management strategies which not only align with the agency's Strategic plan I am honored and grateful by the support each of my leaders and their teams continue to provide not only to me but to the agencies to keep up the great work team um and at this time there are no other updates to provide I'm open to answer any questions or respond to any questions that you may have so I want to be clear we've pulled the related service um increase or originally it was at 1% that is still included in today's um consent agent item to approve the step increase which is a followup of the approval that was provided last year we still want to move forward with honoring a step in increase any changes to what that percentage will be will be proposed in May okay I do want to give give my support to related Services I work with occupational therapists physical therapists speech therapists I share offices with them and I know how valuable the work is so they do to provide access to our kids to the curriculum and and they're hard to find yes and they're hard to retain and we want to be able to keep them and provide them with whatever we can so other questions I have a followup sha um you mentioned that you are doing Market comparisons um across you've done that with the teachers and now you're doing it with the other related staff positions just out of curiosity where are we kind of falling with those based on the initial analysis that the HR team has provided we are within the market um not only have we been looking at excuse me schools within Arizona but other schools for the deaf and the blind as it relates specifically to the related services staff okay um and is that what you are looking at as far as making the proposal for the percent increase for May yes that is also taking into consideration yes okay thank you um we are at 2.01 which is an action item approval of the consent agenda consistent with board policy to include items 3.01 3.02 6.0 1 6.02 6.03 6.04 6.05 6.06 6.07 6.08 6.09 6.10 6.11 6.12 6.13 6.14 6.15 6.16 6.17 6.18 6.19 6.20 6.21 6.22 7.03 and 7.04 go I move that we approve all of those uh consent agenda items I'm not going to repeat them that's fine I have a motion do I have a second you do it ly I have a motion do I have a second I'll second all those in favor say I I I I I any oppositions or abstentions the consent agenda items pass moving on to 4.01 information item Finance report Kim bitr director good afternoon board president kifo superintendent rikman assistant superintendent Cooper acting assistant superintendent Tech members of the board and asdb Community you have been provided our most recent board report report that covers the financial data for January 2023 and 2024 also included is the December financial statement for 2022 and 2023 this data was covered in more detail at our most recent finance committee meeting held last Thursday February 29th with board president Kel and board member Gordon also in attendance we were superintendent rikman and assistant superintendent Cooper the total student count provided in the board report for February 1 2024 is a summarized total based on the data provided by the directors and the principles the new student information system data is still being validated we hope to have the detail information including eligibility categories on the student count similar to what has been provided in the past for the next board meeting the current data shows 2,98 students as of February 1 2024 this is compared to 2,119 students as of February 1 2023 a total decrease of 21 students Tucson campus has increased by seven students while pdsd has decreased by 22 students Regional Cooperative students have decreased by 10 the preschool has decreased by 28 students while birth to three has increased by 32 students as of February 1st we had 504 full-time equivalents which includes 8.5 full-time equivalents at the foundation for blind children at that time we employed staff only 154 are full-time 12 months death there are currently 173 vacancies across the agency that we are actively recruiting for the highlights of the January 2024 Financial board report show a total revenue of 28.4 million 2.3 million lower than the January 2023 revenue of 30.7 million the major difference is the decrease in receipts of the institutional voucher the fee for service revenue and the classroom site fund all of these are tied to the student count the fee for service billing is dependent on the data from the student information system this is offset by an increase in the spend in the general fund the budget fiscal year 2023 obligated expenditures of 37.3 million were 1.5 million less than budget f school year 2024 obligated expenditures of 38.9 million the increase and professional and outside Services includes temporary labor used at the student health center in Tucson and the one toone nurses on the pdsd campus the increase in food is removing the expense to its own classification originally reported under the professional an outside Services the transfers out in budget fiscal year 23 are for the kitchen equipment on both campuses and if there are no questions this concludes my report any questions I do have one followup I think I've asked this before but I'm going to ask again because my memory short um um so on the the change in student count do we know where these students have gone to are we tracking that why we've lost students I don't have an answer for that but I can follow up with you after I talk to that's fine that would work even if you have it for the next financial meeting that would be great great I can do that thank you moving on to 7.01 information and discussion item introduction and possible discussion of policies be be d a j LH and ihbd Maria Murphy director of policy and government relations good evening Madame President members of the board super superintendent rikman assistant superintendent staff and members of the asdb community um board president Kel I do have one small adjustment um we are not reviewing ihbd today we are actually reviewing policy LH I believe that that's just a misprint in the in the agenda okay thank you so you have before you uh the redline policies and these were changes that were made um in response to change uh changes that the Arizona State Legislature placed into Arizona revised Statute with the exception of policy LH policy LH is simply a title change because our accrediting agency is no longer Advanced edit is called cognia so we wanted um to reflect that and then policies be and B specifically are talking about board meetings and what they're talking about is at an ASB board meeting we're required now to make sure that we can reasonably accommodate um members of the public who would like to attend the meeting and we are also required now to let um members of the public know when they will have physical access to the to the uh building finally um policy where did I go yes policy jlh we are just adding in that after a student is enrolled in a public school or a private school asdb is going to request directly from the previous School certified copies of the records within 10 days uh I believe that we are already doing this but we just put this into the policies to tighten it up so with that I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have this is first this is first read correct yes ma'am this is the First Street any questions okay seeing and hearing none we will move on to 7.02 legislative update okay well um I am relieved to let you know that we are actually about um at the Midway point for for the Arizona State legislative session uh I was asked to provide this update to you to let you know specifically about the ASB continuation bills both in the house and in the Senate Unfortunately they did not receive hearings in their respective committees and so they are considered to be um dead for this session um I am continuing to track over 150 bills um and they are they track from board actions things like board meetings public records Etc um continuations I'm tracking about 24 different continuation bills which I wasn't paying particular attention to two years ago but I'm paying very close attention to it now um I can tell you that uh with the continuation bills for the most part it appears that both of the chambers are moving towards cutting down continuations for state agencies so we're seeing a lot of them go from 8 years down to 4 years there's still a few outline ERS of um 8 to 10 years but again those those are big uh outliers and uh interestingly enough every time a continuation Bill comes through I can always count on um bipartisan members of both the house and the Senate to speak up and say well what about asdb why didn't you give asdb an 8-year continuation last year so we we have some very vocal members on on from both parties who are continuing to advocate for ASB and the continuation um we also have some human resource related bills a few operations bills of course I continue to track the education bills as well most of these education bills the majority of them do not directly affect asdb however they affect our partner districts so we always want to make sure that we're tracking to see what's happening with our partner districts and also for some of these um bills that have uh grant opportunities attached to them to see if possibly there might be an ability for asdb to be able to get um an amendment to allow us the opportunity to um to qualify for some of these grants so I've actually been working uh with my counterpart at ad uh regarding some of these Grant programs and even though I haven't been successful getting an amendment yet um I do have a commitment from ad that they will continue to work with us in the interim to try to assist us so I I see you look like you're going to ask a question I have a question yes um so I understand that the continuation Bill died in committee um also the transportation bill as well are we looking at any way of doing some sort of amendment to get that back in front of a committee so um specifically the transportation specifically the transportation bill so um what I can tell you um Madam president is that there are still 69 what we call strike everything bills okay that are out there and it is theoretically possible for us to um approach Alle legislator to ask if we could use their strike everything Bill to try to revive um this appropriation bill I will tell you that I don't hold out too much hope of um getting that bill through because it is an Appropriations bill Bill and as we're starting to inch closer to May and June all of the appropriation bills are going to stop moving because um that the leadership in the house in the Senate and the governor's office are going to start negotiating the budget in Earnest and uh my plan B is that I am going to be literally walking up and down the hallways uh in the senate in the house knocking on the door giving them our fact sheets talking to them about the urgent need that we have for this funding and how every year we go without this additional funding the problems Compound on us and what I'm going to be doing is asking every single legislator please please will you be a champion for us on this please will you put this on your priority budget list and the leadership of the legislature they do listen to their Rank and file legislators and if enough of them if we can get a critical mass of people who are asking to include this funding then there's a better chance that it'll make it into um into the final budget we know that um part of this funding is already included in the executive proposal the executive budget proposal from the n9th floor um but ultimately that's that that's kind of a starting negotiation and the legislature is going to come back with their with their counter offer all right thank you then that's all I needed any other questions okay thank you thank you moving on to 8.01 call to the public on non-agenda items um we have two on non-agenda items one was um posted online do you have that right away no okay so then and second we have Libby I'm don't want to butcher your last name is it brous correct it is brous hello everyone and thank you for your time today my name is Libby Brouse and I'm a preschool teacher at pdsd as well as the vice president of the Arizona school for the deaf and blind Educators Association as the ascb community gets ready to enter the F fourth quarter of the school year some of us are also looking forward to the 2024 2025 school year contracts will be coming out and teachers will be wondering and preparing for their future case loads Food Service workers and transportation staff might be wondering about new initiatives or planning bus routes related service providers will be considering case load sizes and hoping for positions to be filled interpreters are maybe thinking about the downtime they will have before things get really busy again it and the media teams might be planning new strategies for technology roll out in managing all of the behind the scenes work that make meetings like today accessible leadership I am sure is already planning professional development and ways to set up the next school year to be successful as planning begins to happen in the asdb community the members of the Arizona school for the deaf and blind Educators Association would like the board to consider what they might beol involved in planning we are requesting the board to set up another work study session to continue the discussion and consideration of creating our agencies own H policy also known as meet and confer those in our community may not know that since the 70s asdb has had an Education Association or a union we are an active body working to spread awareness in our community with all staff members we are looking to grow our relationship with the board through establishing an H policy Y and the way through this process is through continued open dialogue we hope plans are being set to figure out how to take the next step in the decision process for the board to enter into a relationship with asb's Union in order to continue developing plans for our community and implementing those plans that are already in action after listening to to the meeting today these plans can include working with the Arizona Arizona school for the death and blind Educators Association to include staff on the assistant superintendent interview panel gather feedback on the master facility plan communicate with staff on the information and work that's done at all of these board meetings or working with Maria Murphy and the Arizona Educators Association for monitoring bills in the Arizona legislature thank you thank you thank you um yes so the second uh non-agenda item we got was um from a parent of a current student first Elizabeth Smith are you here before I summarize your comments um most of the comment is um about uh parent involvement to support students and teachers um and uh parent how parents are not uh feeling slightly disconnected Ed from involvement in classrooms thank you moving on to 8.02 discussion item agenda items for the next regular board meeting which is scheduled for May 9th of 2024 in Phoenix okay um anything that would come up after the meeting you can either share with myself or superintendent wman um do we have an April work study planned yet okay um do not let let us consider that we might need to pick some dates and see if we can get something on the calendar um if no other items for the next agenda I have 9.01 action item adjournment yes that's my job I move that we adjourn this meeting do I have a second a second all right thank you very much all those in favor and have a good evening everybody thank you meeting is adjourned at 5 um 04 p.m. this is a [Laughter] miracle